


Empire's SHIELD

by Celticas



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: A-sexual Maria Hill, F/F, F/M, Hydra is also a thing, Loki is still a Bad Guy, M/M, MTH2019, Multi, Not a Loki Redemption Story, Pirates!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:41:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 25,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23044942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celticas/pseuds/Celticas
Summary: They weren't your traditional Pirates. Outside the law because the law was stupid. Marcus "Fury" Johnson lead his crew of misfits as well as he could but trouble would always find them. They just didn't expect it to be an enslaved crew and a psychotic captain.
Relationships: Clint Barton/Phil Coulson, James "Bucky" Barnes/ Jemma Simmons/ Skye | Daisy Johnson, Jemma Simmons/Skye | Daisy Johnson, Nick Fury/Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, pre - Bruce Banner/ Leo Fitz
Comments: 24
Kudos: 41
Collections: Marvel Trumps Hate 2019





	1. Marcus

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ruquas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruquas/gifts).



The large ship swayed gently on the slight swell. A few heavy glass weights kept the overlapped layers of maps and logs and letters from sliding off the rough-hewn wood and onto the thickly carpeted floor. It was the only room on the ship that had carpets, but after four years of hard use, they were starting to look a little threadbare. Salt, sand, and sun ground deep and slowly leeching the colours from the fibres.

Two men were bent over the table. Quietly conversing, they didn’t notice the soft movement, long accustomed to the dance of the tides and the pull of time. Most of their things were starting to show the toll of long years at sea without the funds to spare. Captain Marcus Fury stood straight with a groan, one hand pushing into the stiff muscles of his back and other going to his head to try and massage the tension headache away. They weren’t going to find another four crewmembers by breaking their backs over paperwork.

Stalking away from the largest piece of furniture in the room, he stopped at the narrow band of windows that ran the length of the back of the room. Looking out at the pale blue sweep of ocean and the frothy white water marking their trail, he mentally worked through releasing each of his knotted muscles. Starting with his neck and working his way down. The process gave him time to gather his thoughts.

“We’re going to need to go into one of the bigger islands. Maybe even the mainland to plug our holes aren’t we?” He asked the man standing at his back.

Going anywhere close to civilisation was a risk. There were still sizable rewards on all of their heads and the memories were long in the poorer parts of the world. At the moment they were safe, sailing between the outer reaches of the Azores Islands, only dealing with people they knew and trusted. And incidentally a good double handful of them owed his crew their lives.

“Yes.” His first mate agreed. No further explanation; it wasn’t his style to waste words.

The irony of that compared to the man’s partner always amused Marcus. Phillip used the least amount of words possible, while Clinton couldn’t shut up. One of the only good things to come out of that cluster fuck four years ago was the loss of Military Law, and the two men being able to do something about the suffocating sexual tension between them. Everyone else had raised a glass in silent thanks to being free of that burden. Now if only the two idiots would move on from the sickening sweetness of new lovers.

Marcus didn’t want, or need, to know the details of the relationship, he was just happy for his oldest friend. Phillip wasn’t the only one who had benefited on a personal level though. Almost every one of his crew had settled, Marcus himself included. Thoughts of his fiery red head brought a briefly lived smile to his rugged face. The prickly nature, which was sometimes literal, of his lover was one of the things that attracted him to her.

“Chart a course to Vila Do Corvo. We’ll stock up there and then head for Tenerife.” He finally decided.

A friendly port where they could all relax a little would be welcome before venturing into the treacherous waters of the larger island group.

“Sir.”

The soft pad of ridged leather soles on the carpet and the creak of the door opening and closing signal the exit of his first mate. Alone, he let the stiff tension release from his shoulders. The exhaustion he kept carefully hidden on full display to an empty room. The years of dodging the Royal Navies of almost every country in Europe and the actual pirates, as much as they call Marcus and his crew pirates he can’t think of them like that, has worn him out. For his people he grins and bares it, buries it until he can almost convince himself that the worry isn’t there. But in those moments of quiet, between one crisis and the next, he allows himself to remember what it is to be human. To be fallible.

Thin, strong arms slipped around his waist. A warm body pressing against his back. “It will be okay Ony.” Natalia whispered into the time-soft linen covering his shoulder blades. “Come, do not shut yourself away in the dark. You should be standing in the light.” Unrelentingly she drew him backwards, one step, and then two. Pulling him back into reality.

Returning the unbending steel to his spine, he acquiesced and followed her out of the cabin. Even after years on this boat, he still grumbled silently to himself at having to duck under the lintel between the corridor that held the doors to his, Phillips, and Doc Simmons’ cabins, and the next section of the ship. The ladder up to the main deck was down, sitting securely in a square of golden sunlight.

The slap of loose canvas, clinking of metal, and calls of his crew filtered down into the dusty darkness. He took a second to draw in a lung full of cool air before hauling himself up. The few people close by snapped him a lazy salute but kept working. He preferred this from the stupid military requirement that they stop and genuflect. It had been the first stupid rule he had gotten rid of after their flight from official service.

“Gentlemen.” He nodded at them but kept moving.

Phillip was up on the quarter deck bent over another table. This time he was joined by the dark head of their navigator, Skye. She was a relatively new addition, joining the crew of the Empire’s Shield in Rabat two years ago. She was young. Too young. But the girl had literally been born on a ship and learnt to read the lines on a map and the stars in the sky before she could read letters on a page. He trusted her more than their last navigator, the illegitimate son of a squire whose daddy had paid for the kid to be shuffled out of sight.

Exchanging quiet words with those he passed, it took twice as long to reach the pair as it should have. But he didn’t mind, staying in touch with the crew and the warm sun on his bald head felt good.

The wood started to tilt under his feet as Phillip spun the large wheel to change their heading. Thick canvas filled with a snap, and the ship bounded eagerly forward, jolting those few who weren’t ready for the change.

“We’re not too far North, should be there by sundown.” Skye’s lightly accented voice greeted him. She sounded like she came from everywhere and nowhere. That wasn’t necessarily wrong.

He acknowledged her with a sharp nod; he respected her, but she was Coulson’s responsibility. He had brought her on board and dealt with her, and most of the crew, much more than Fury did.

Marcus’ job was to figure out where they were going, Phillip’s was to get them there. He left them to it, sweeping up the quarter deck and onto the Stern deck. Fury refused to call it the  _ poop deck _ ; the look on Barton’s face each time the look out said it was bad enough, he didn’t need to say it himself. 

The large expanse of wood was the largest, empty, open air space on the ship; the other three open air decks were filled with bustling people, sails, ropes, wood, and countless other bits and pieces of detritus that kept his old girl running smooth. It offered him the perfect vantage to look down on his little kingdom, able to spot trouble before it began. Turning the thought around on himself, the Stern Deck made him accessible by all of the crew when he was up there. Any concerns or questions could be voiced, letting discord drift away on the wind rather than getting caught up in the confines of his cabin.

Not quite half of his people were up on deck, Phillip and Skye were still on the Quarter deck, but had abandoned their maps for the wheel and a polished sextant. The Doc was curled up on a pile of ropes next to the stairs down onto the Spar Deck, to all appearances asleep but if he was a betting man, he would say she was watching Skye. Her fascination, and more, with the navigator was a poorly kept secret. Natasha had followed him up onto the deck, and was flowing through a fighting dance and throwing occasional insults up at her brother. Looking at her, he couldn’t help but follow her focus high up the Main Mast and into the Crowsnest. 

Slightly too long, white blonde hair ruffling in the stronger wind in his high perch, Clinton Barton watched Phillip more than the horizon he was meant to be focused on. In others, the blatant dereliction of duty would have had him hanging off the bowsprit by his ankles. But the man was uncanny. The crew whispered in the dark of night, calling him Ophanim, one of the all seeing protectors of heaven. Marcus called him Argus Panoptes, a too observant pain in his ass. Even with his eyes on Coulson, Barton would still be able to see anything that was coming for them, on or under the water.

The crash of metal against metal, pulled his attention from the highest point of his ship. Snapping his head down, he glared at his bosun. Realising what he was doing, he bit the inside of his lip and tried to dial it back. Fitz had been the best bosun he had ever had. Had been. The kid was still recovering from a bad knock to the head when that asshole Pierce had tried to steal his ship out from under him. One of his arms was still weak and talking to him took a while. But under it all, he was as sharp as he had always been and he was getting better every day.

Better to ignore the accident. The last of his core crew was Maria Hill. She was also the only one not on deck. Somewhere in the bowels of the ship, she was either asleep or terrorising one of the double handful of crew who were off duty.

Arms crossed, he settled against the heavy wooden railing, content to watch the organised chaos of  _ his _ people.

= + =

A rising tide of voices floated down out of the rigging as the crew sung to keep time in furling the large main sail. If they didn’t furl it properly, it wouldn’t  _ unfurl _ properly and that would be a problem. The wood shifted under his feet, Phillip at the helm spinning the wheel as fast as he could to swing the ship around and bring it into the small harbour. The change of direction brought them directly into line with the rapidly setting sun. Red light painted the canvas of the foresail blood red.

Fury noted the colour happily. They should be able to stock up and be out with the morning tide. Being too close to dried land, particularly a place that could be linked directly back to them, made his skin itch.

There was barely a bump as the final bit of their momentum was lost against cloth bundles and the dock.

“Davis! Piper! Woo! Triplett! Get those lines secured!” Phillip’s shout had the named quartet jumping into action, Marcus was pleased to see.

The smooth operation of his crew after the turmoil was always a pleasure to see. Without incident or injury and as quick as it was humanly possible, the large ship was moored. The crew scrambled to complete the last bits of their jobs in anticipation of going ashore. As the last rays of daylight disappeared, the mad scramble aboard the Empire’s Shield abated. A handful of the crew were staying on board, as watch or just because they didn’t want to go into town. The rest dispersed into the shadows quickly.

Marcus acknowledged Maria’s two fingered salute; she had control until he or Phillip returned. Business would keep him on land for a few hours, and he had spied Phillip and Barton slipping over board and down the beach, if someone offered the wager, he would say they would be the last ones back on board. Taking the opportunity for some privacy.

It was a thought he might entertain himself with later, once his job was done. Walking the well trodden path, Marcus kept an eye out for his crew among the timber and stone buildings. Fitz’s short, hesitant form was cast into shadow by Vulcan’s fire. The ringing of burning metal on burning metal drowning out any conversation that was going on inside the building. Triplett, Woo, and Davis were heading to the single gambling den in the tiny town. They wouldn’t find much competition there, but from the snatches of conversation he heard, he knew it wasn’t that gold that interested them, but the chance to converse with someone new.

Those towns people who were not at home asleep or in the gambling den were at the tavern, most of them greeting him with a smile as he stepped onto the wide veranda. Tables were scattered between himself and the long wooden bar, a labyrinth of people and furniture that could ensnare even the most cautious of people. It looked like chaos, but was a carefully laid out plan to keep people within the building and drinking for as long as possible. The owner was quiet but knew his trade.

“Bruce.” He called, catching the shorter man’s attention.

Bruce held up a finger, asking for a moment to finish with the customer he was serving. Marcus gave it to him, for all that the patrons drank deeply it was still one of the most well behaved establishments in the whole island chain, all because of the rage the dwelt deep within the owner and only took a small spark to ignite.

“Fury.” His voice was low. Soft and unassuming under the roar of voices and waves on the not so distant beach. “The usual? I also have some good far east tea for your navigator and scotch for yourself.” Skye and the navigator had bonded on first meeting over a taste for the bitter brew that no one else would touch. Few of their ports stocked it, but Bruce always kept some aside for her when he had it in. He still had one of the bottles of fiery alcohol in his cabin from their last stop but it always made good barter and if it was going he would take it.

Bruce, and the rest of the town, might have owed him and his crew their lives, but that didn’t mean he went easy on their negotiations. Making a living so far from civilisation was hard and a single poor deal or harsh season would mean ruin for them all.

“I have a box of al-halkum for the tea. Skye picked it up special. I’ll add a shilling for the scotch.” Fury held out his hand to shake on the offered price. He would be handing over the money now and then Darcy, the bar-maid, would bring down the goods when she had a free moment with the help of any of his crew she could wrangle.

Bruce was shaking his head before Marcus had even finished.

“The al-halkum and the shilling are fine, but the last ship didn’t come in, the cost of salt went up. You need to add another five pence for the salted herring.” Bruce lent away from the counter, arms crossed. He wasn’t going to budge.

Marcus knew this dance, he led it with most of the traders he dealt with. It could go either way with the bar owner, if it was a serious increase because of actual costs he wouldn’t budge. The danger was that if Marcus pushed, he would end up refusing the whole order. On the other hand if it was a fishing expedition, there would be some wriggle room, but any price added would be added to every future order.

“Two.” He cast his dice.

“Five.”

“Three, and a one quarter  _ real _ .” The addition of a second currency might tempt him, expand his options.

“Five. Or four, and a one quarter  _ real. _ ”

It was serious then.

He handed over the coins. Unwilling to burn this bridge, his crew didn’t have many left and they had a lot of threads twined into this community.

Perfectly timed, a hand slid across his lower back as Bruce swept the coins into the small bag he kept on his belt.

“Time for a drink before we return?” Natasha asked, her voice low and enticing. Red head leant gently against his shoulder.

His own arm slipped around her shoulders, drawing her in that last little bit.

“We can have two if you want.”

Smiling they found a table in a dark corner to whyle the night away.


	2. Chapter 2

The earliest rays of dawn painted his lover’s back pink and gold. He whispered a single finger tip down the length of Clint’s spine, perfectly sculpted muscles twitching at the soft touch. The chances the two men had to be fully, completely alone together were few and always too short. He was loathe to end this interlude, but the tide was turning the Empire’s Shield would sail soon, with or without them because Marcus was a dick like that.

“Wake up love. Back to work.” Phillip whispered into Clint’s ear, lips ghosting against flesh. Under his hand that was resting lightly on the deep curve just above the perfect ass of his perfect _heart_ rose in goosebumps. A shiver running through the other man’s body. 

“Mornin’.” Clint murmured into the arm his head was pillowed in.

Turning his head, their eyes met. Cool silver-blue to green-blue, as changeable as the ocean they made their lives on. It was the first thing Phillip had noticed about the other man, not the physique that turned so many heads, but the eyes decades older than the face holding them. 

“Good morning.” Pressing a final kiss high onto Clint’s cheek bone, he levered himself off the pile of blankets they kept stashed in one of the sea caves. He bustled around the small cave as Clint struggled his way into full wakefulness. 

They had to race to the dock to meet the Empire’s SHIELD before it cast off with the dawn.

“Sorry Sir.” Phillip puffed as they sprinted up the gangway.

As was his want, Marcus glared. It was no less effective for being monocular.

Leaving the Captain behind, the two men split up, Clint to scramble up the main mast to help unfurl the large main sail. From their Phillip knew he would continue up to the very top of the mast to take his post in the crows nest once they were underway. The height turned Phillip’s stomach slightly, but Clint loved it. The unobstructed view to the edges of the world and beyond.

Turning his mind from his lover, Phillip continued toward the stern of the ship, dodging people and coils or rope and stacks of sails and nets waiting to be mended and returned to use. There was a pattern in the chaos. Life in the never-ending work.

“Maria.” He nodded at the Night Watch Master.

"You are late.” She grouched, handing off the wheel and quickly disappearing into the depths of the ship in search of her bed.

Shrugging he put the sleep-deprived rudeness from his mind and focused on the task at hand. Getting out of the harbour was not hard, but that was no reason to let his attention wander. There weren’t any geological hazards, but there could be faunal. He easily fell into the rhythm of sailing. The uneven rocking of the boat, the call and answer of the crew, the slap of the sails and rigging. His mind drifted on the currents that drew his vessel forward.

= + =

The weather faired them well and two nights later they were rounding the large headland as the final rays of day bounced off the growing waves and seemed to turn the whole world red and orange.

“See here.” Marcus called for attention.

Maria had gathered the few crew from below deck and now every spare scrap of deck was filled with a body.

“You’ve all been through this before. Woo, Percy, Triplett, and Fitz you will be going into town as decoys. I expect all four of you back as soon as possible, you know the drill. Get to it.”

Phil listened to the instructions with half an ear, he knew the drill and his own instructions had been given hours ago.

“Wish I was coming with you?” Clint had appeared next to him at some point. He didn’t bother jumping, it happened too often.

“You don’t sound sure about that.” Phil smiled softly at him.

Clint plastered himself against Phil’s back, forcing him to work against the added weight.

“Not really. People are weird.” Said the man who had been named after a bird and prefered a full longbow on a ship instead of a crossbow or even one of the new flintlock muskets.

“It will just be a quick in and out.”

“That’s what she said.” Clint smirked.

Ignoring that comment, Phil kept an eye on the slowly approaching dock, but dropped a quick kiss on Clint’s stubbled check. Obviously satisfied that he had gotten his fill of Phil’s attention, Clint wandered off again. So close to shore he wasn’t needed. Most likely, he was in the process of wrangling whoever he could for a card game, Maria, Natasha, Jemma, and Skye were his most likely targets.

With the slightest bump, Phil settled the wooden hull against the long wharf. Even so, he grumbled silently to himself. The landing should have been smooth enough that the water in the rain barrels didn’t waver. No one else would complain, he was, or had been, the best helmsman in the Royal Navy and probably one of the top in the world. But that was down to unwavering perfectionism and he wasn’t going to let himself get lax just because he wasn’t wearing a uniform anymore.

“Get to it Coulson.” Marcus spoke from beside him.

Unlike Clint, Phil had known Marcus had been approaching purely from the wave of crew parting like the Red Sea in front of Moses.

“I want to be away on the midnight tide. That only gives you a few hours to find our newest lost puppies.” With a swirl of his weather inappropriate thick black wool coat, the Captain was gone again to terrorise a different knot of crew.

Tying off the helm, he wound his way off the ship, following Percy and Fitz who were loudly discussing which ‘Drinking Establishment’ they were going to visit. Subtle those two were not. By the time he reached the end of the long wharf, Percy was leaning against Fitz’s side, arm threaded through his and whispering sweet nothings into his ear. They were the picture of a young couple in love.

When they turned right into the more affluent quarter, Phil turned left, heading for not quite the slums but the downtrodden little back alleys that seeped poverty that was still clinging on to respectability. They weren’t looking for actual criminals, they had learnt that lesson the hard way with Ward. Instead, they wanted people down on their luck who were looking for a way to turn their fortunes, or at least change their circumstances.

Slipping through shadows and the too few pools of light, he listened. Waiting for the conversation that would tip him off to the people they needed.

“No Buck.” A strong voice cracked through the night as his time was almost up.

“Stevie we have to do something! And you ain’t my boss anymore.” A man slightly taller than Phil and almost as broad as Clint barrelled out of a door lost in the depths of the night. He wasn’t looking where he was going and ran straight into Phil.

“Shit.” The unknown man glared at the scuffed skin and dirt on his hand, and then at Phil as if he was at fault for knocking them both down. “Watch it.”

“Buck! He really is sorry. Here, let me help you. Can we get you anything for that?” The second voice emerged from their room, a head taller than the first man and as light as the other man was dark.

Phil looked at where he was indicating, bright red was seeping out of his palm where he had fallen on a broken bottle.

“Please.” Easily he accepted the offered hand, unwilling to risk whatever else was on the uneven cobbles.

“Come on in, it isn’t much but I can get that cleaned up for you. I’m Steve, and the slightly hostile one is Bucky.” Steve babbled kindly as he waved Phil into the single, cramped room before them.

Two tiny bunks were shoved against two of the walls and a table against the third, the fourth held the door. A single chair sitting lopsided under the table was the only other furniture.

“Sit.” Steve darted around him, knocking against one of the beds and the table before getting the chair out for him. With a bashful smile, he dove to the ground and dug around under the bed he had walked into.

In the doorway, a shadow of death, or just creepy, Bucky loomed. Sharp eyes watching the stranger in his space.

With a victorious yell, Steve extracted himself from the bed, a leather satchel clasped in one large hand. Sitting on the bed, he dug in, pulling skeans of cotton and a bottle of alcohol not fit for human consumption out and dropping them onto the thin matress at his him.

“Give me that.” Bucky lunged across the room as Steve struggled with the cap on the bottle.

The smile Steve threw at Phil suggested Bucky was doing exactly what Steve wanted. The dark man grumbling as he crossed the small room. “Like you would have any idea how to patch someone up… spent all our…. your stupid ass. Here.” More gently than Phil would have expected, Bucky pressed an alcohol damp clump of cotton on his hand. It stung but no more than he knew it would.

After a minute, he peeled the cloth away and then tipped Phil’s hand to the light, looking for glass or dirt. Satisfied, he efficiently wrapped the wound and knotted off the ends.

“There. All better. Now, get out.” He growled.

“Bucky!” Steve yelped.

“I’m sorry for inconveniencing you.” Phil returned, voice too flat for either of the strangers to know the intent behind the words.

Sliding back into the night, he flattened himself in the pool shadow and listened to the two men.

“That was rude.” Steve chastised, the sound of wood scraping against wood undercut him.

Someone snorted, Phil assumed it was the more taciturn of the two.

“Bucky, we have no idea who he is. Think about what he was wearing, there is money there and we need a job.”

“Stevie, no one with money is going to be walking down our street. At least not unless they have every finger in something criminal.” Bucky scoffed patronisingly.

Nothing he had seen suggested these two were… of the unsavoury type… and the conversation he was listening to now re-enforced that impression. The one remaining question was how to offer them a job without being the creep listening at their window.

“Oh, a little spy listening at keyholes.”

Oil slid down Phil’s spine. A voice more openly evil than any he had heard before oozed out of the darkness behind him. Spinning, he reached for the blade at his hip.

“I think not.” A flash of light on a wickedly curved edge was his only warning before white hot pain lanced through his arm.

He could do nothing but scream.

“What the fuck?”

“What was that?”

Noise burst out from the room he had been listening into. A parry and a spark of metal on metal and the burning pain retreated slightly, the unnaturally cold metal withdrawing from the warmth of his shoulder.

Darkness encroached on his vision. His hearing came in and out of focus as if he was swimming, breaching the surface and then ducking under a rough sea again. 

“We can’t….. Ste… Help…” A voice growled.

“Bu… wh..i…” Someone else insisted.

“Empire...s….Shie….” He managed to slur before giving up the last of his grip on reality, sinking into an ocean that didn’t want to let him go.


	3. Clint

Sharp eyes watched Phil saunter into town, a chill of foreboding racing down Clint’s spine. He didn’t like any of the crew being out in a hostile town, or at least not friendly, without someone watching their back. But on this moonless night he thought it was more. Something was hiding in the shadows that he couldn’t  _ see. _

From his perch in the crows nest, he watched Phil until he was lost in the maze of streets and buildings that could be sheltering any number of monsters. Leaning back against the mast he turned his eyes up. At even his lowest point the stars had been there for him, unchanging watchmen guiding him home. His small platform was the only true privacy he found on the large ship, even in Phil’s cabin Clint was acutely aware of the Captain on one side and the Doc’s across the very small corridor. Up here, all he could hear was the sigh of the breeze through the rigging, the flap of material at rest and metal clinking together from where someone hadn’t properly tied off a line.

It was peace and freedom and safety.

He lost himself in the slow dance of the stars. Smiling softly as they winked at him from untold distances.

“Who goes there?” Maria’s call was faint, almost lost on the growing breeze.

Someone answered but their words were twisted into highs and lows that only barely resembled words.

“Get Simmons! Davis, Piper, Lincoln. Help them. CLINT!” A note he had never heard in the night master’s voice before had him scrambling down the rigging at more of a controlled fall than an uncontrolled climb. He hadn’t even looked to see what was happening but the chill from earlier in the night was back and spreading, freezing his insides. 

It was Phil and it was bad.

The deck was awash in light when his feet landed on the wood with a dull thump. Two men he didn’t know had Phil’s limp form slung over their shoulders. Maria and Marcus facing off against them.

“Move.” He shoved his way through the crowd, dispensing elbows and kicks were needed to get the crew to disperse. Making room for himself and the tiny doctor who had popped out of the hatch at the same time he had landed.

“Oh god. Phil.” He ignored his Captain, racing forward to lay a gentle hand on his lover’s cheek, the other hand looking for and finding a pulse. “What happened?”

“Clint?” The blonde giant under one arm asked.

“Hu? Yeah. What happened!” He demanded again, a hair’s breadth from violence.

“Some Sumasshedshiy jumped him in the dark.” The shorter of the two giants spoke for the first time.

“Crazy.” Nat translated.

“Let’s get him down into my cabin. This is more than blood loss. Tell me exactly what happened? Where was he hit and how many times? Did you  _ stop to patch him up? _ ” Jemma thundered.

“Cast off,” Fury called, spurring the crew into action.

“Hey, wait a minute. We gotta get off.” The shorter giant protested, pulling Phil and the taller giant to an abrupt halt.   
Triplett tripped over them as he rushed for the mizzen mast.

Everything was happening too fast and not fast enough. Every second, Phil was losing the little bit of colour he had left and his skin was chilled and clammy under his hand.

“Then give him here and get off.” Clint tried to push his way between Phil and the blonde.

“We got two bunks going spare. Want them?” Fury asked at the same time.

“Are you recruiting right now?” He gave up trying to force Big and Blonde away from Phil and got into the Captain’s face. “Are you fucking recruiting when Phil is...Phil is… Fuck!”

The brunette let him take his portion of Phil’s weight without comment. Triplett taking the other side. In lockstep, they carried the unconscious first-mate down into the gloomy belly of their home. Awkward in the small space, they followed the diminutive doctor.

“Lay him down. Let’s have a look at what we are dealing with. Bring that light closer.” She ordered them around her little kingdom. Efficiently shuffling them out of the way and set to work.

Clint had to hold himself still and remind himself that he trusted Jemma when she palmed a blade and began cutting away Phil’s clothes. Exposing the wound, she drew the lamp closer.

“It’s still bleeding. Should have clotted by now, at least a little. Okay. I need to sew this…..” She muttered to herself as she worked.

When she thrust her knife into the flame and it set it against Phil’s skin, Clint couldn’t hold himself back anymore.

“Stop! What!”

Trip grabbed him before he could reach her. The three of them swayed with the movement of the ship as the slight breeze caught in at least one of the sails high above them. They were underway.

It barely made a dent in Clint’s awareness, too focused on Jemma and the fact she was  _ cutting into Phil. _

“Aren’t you meant to be fixing him?”

“I need to sew him but, which means I need to get to the wound. A vein is cut I think. HA! There.” With economical movements, she plunged a needle and thread into Phil’s shoulder, one, two, three, four times. 

Quickly she closed up the cut  _ she _ had made and waved Trip over.

“Hold him up.” She ordered and then wrapped long lines of cotton around her work and under Phil’s other arm, swathing his chest in white.

“He can go back to his cabin. But keep an eye on him. If he wakes, get him to drink as much as he can and some bread soaked in milk if possible.”

With Trip’s help, Clint was able to get Phil across the way and into their little room. Easing him onto the mattress he sat to watch and wait. Trip returned at some point with a pitcher of beer and the milk and bread.

= + =

Twice through the long night and into the early morning Phil jerked awake and Clint was able to dribble a few drops of water and crumbs of bread down his throat. In fits and starts, he snatched sleep where he could. Waking after a few minutes to check that Phil’s chest was still rising.

“Clint?” Skye’s whisper startled him.

He hadn’t heard the door creak when she entered.

“Bàoqiàn. Sorry. It’s your watch.” She slipped into his seat.

Phil had been the one to offer her a new home, safety after the streets of Morocco. After stealing to feed herself. The cross on her hand marking her for life. After himself, she was the one he would most trust with Phil’s life. The first mate was almost paternal when it came to the too young navigator.

Silently he left the sickroom. Ignoring the people that tried to talk to him on his way up. Until Phil was back up and around there wasn’t anything they could say to make him feel better and he didn’t feel up to assuaging their worry if he couldn’t be.

Squinting at the glare of the sun he continued to dodge people, and then was able to leave them all behind. Scrambling easily up the swaying rigging, getting higher and higher until he was on top of the world. 

Mount nodded at him in greeting and was then threw himself off the other side of the small platform. He would be looking for his bed after a long night and morning of watching over their people.

Clint returned the nod and twisted his hands in a quick ‘sleep well’. Mount’s eyes weren’t as good as Clint’s but his ears were better and he was able to hear changes in the weather before others could see them. Not being able to talk to the rest of the crew from their high perch suited him, a stoppered bell was their method of warning the ship, different patterns meaning different things.

Wrapping a thick, waxed blanket around his shoulders as protection against the damp chill that never abated no matter how close to the equator they sailed. Settling into the depths of his own mind he let his thoughts drift. Watching the world fly past below him, not truly conscious but aware of every slight change.

A dark smudge on the horizon pulled from back to alertness. Straining his eyes to their limits he saw tiny lightning flash under deep purple clouds. The blanket dropped to the wooden platform as he lunged for the bell. Dropping the leather stopped on top of the blanket he swing the rope on the end of the bronze clapper. Tolling three long times and then twice sharply, he let the crew on the deck know there was a storm coming. Checking the sky he tolls again, one long ring and then two sharp, North West the direction they were going. A final flick of his wrist rang five short blasts, five nautical miles out.

They would know it was an estimate, but they trusted his eyes and his ability to judge how far something was. Glancing over the short railing, Clint watched as the deck burst into activity, a kicked ants nest. Satisfied that he had been heard, he went about his own duties. Wet weather gear came out of the small chest bolted to the mast, a coat and wide-brimmed hat. Tying them on, he then lashed himself to the mast with well-practised knots. His blanket replaced the coat and hat in the chest. Rather than stoppering the bell, he stuck his hand in the mouth. While he was still up high, he would need to be able to ring it without delay and once he quit his post no one would hear it tolling over the storm.

Over the next, not quite an hour, he rang the bell four more times. Updating the distance as the crew worked to turn them away. The edge of the storm hit suddenly, an almost perfect line down the sky split the world into sun and sheets of rain. In a breath, the water had soaked him from the outer layer to innermost. 

Now was the do or die moment. Stay and ride it out, hoping that the main mast made it through, with him attached. Or cut the ropes and get down. They were skating along the edge at the moment, if he had spotted it fast enough and the storm wasn’t too wide, he would be fine to stay… Eyeing the small, sharp knife in his boot, he left it there. Hunkering down for the duration.

Even in the biggest squalls at the top of a violently swaying pole, Clint didn’t feel even slightly sick. He was born to the height and the waves. Phil joked that his boyhood nickname of Hawkeye was more apt than his brother could have guessed. Given for his eyes, he was also more comfortable up high looking down on the rest of the world.

Salt stung his eyes and burnt on wind and cold chapped lips. The ocean reached up to touch him where no one else could. He couldn’t see them, but he knew the crew were still working. Tied to their own ropes and struggling against the drag of waves and wind and rain to keep the ship moving. 

Deep into the night the wood groaned and salt-encrusted every edge turning the ship white. A ghost ship in a storm that felt like it wouldn’t end to Clint, worry about the crew, about himself, about Phil down below injured and unconscious.

Just before dawn, the waves lessened and the rain turned from an impenetrable sheet to a drizzle and then tapered off to nothing. He could see beyond the bow and stern of the ship again but all there was, was unending slate water, clouds and water the same colour. With ice-cold fingers he struggled to get his knife out of his boot, the ropes too swollen with water to undo.

Sawing through the strands he freed himself. Slipping and sliding down ropes that he could barely feel, he stumbled when he hit the deck. It took him an embarrassing two steps to gain his balance. Mount patted his shoulder on his way past. Technically, Clint should have waited until the other man met him up top, but he couldn’t wait any more. Even in his desperation to check on Phil, he couldn’t bring himself to walk past his friends. His family.

Exchanging a few words, checking that no one had gone overboard, although they would have lit the warning lantern if someone had, and that the ship had come through unscathed. Reassured that all was in as good order as possible, he tripped his way down the steep stairs and into the corridor that was no less gloomy than up on deck had been.

“How’s he been?” He asked Skye as he sat next to her.

“Woke up a few times. Drank a little. No fever.” The lover of a doctor, she knew what was important.

“Thanks. You?” The dark hid but didn’t erase the dark circles under her eyes and the crease between her brows. He slung an arm around her shoulders, pulled her in close for a hug.

She didn’t answer, but lent in closer, seeking warmth and comfort from the embrace.

He didn’t think he would fall asleep but the long shift and rough seas had worn him out. At some point Skye had left him to it, even dropping the spare blanket over his legs before she went.

“Hello.” Phil croaked at him from the bunk, bright aware eyes watched him as he blinked away.

“Phil.” They stared at each other for a long second until Phil started coughing. “Shit. Here.” Lunging for the wooden water cup, he knocked over the small stack of books they kept, replacing volumes as they could. “Shit.” He left them on the floor, holding out the drink for Phil instead.

“Thanks.” Phil whispered, the water soothing the roughness of his throat.

“How ya feeling?” Clint smoothed the sweat-damp hair away from his face, letting his hand rest against his cool cheek.

“Cold.” Phil lent into the touch.

“Move over.” Clint draped his own blanket on top of the three already covering Phil, including one he recognised as Jemma’s rag quilt. Flipping up the edge, he swung himself onto the platform, wedging Phil between him and the wall.

The press of Phil’s cold feet against his sent shivers through his body and drew an undignified yelp from Clint.

“Cruel, cruel man.” Clint lightly kissed him and then shuffled them both horizontal. “Sleep.” 

“Yes, sir.”


	4. Maria

Maria stalked through her people, watching as they set the ship to rights. Working under the weak sunlight of midmorning after a storm, she had to glare more than usual, her eyes more used to deep night than the bright day. Everything was topsy-turvy though. Her crew was in the daylight, Phil was too weak to get out of bed, and Skye was glaring at her maps and instruments in turn trying to work out where they were.

Assured that everything was slowly being put back into its place, she went to check on the navigator. Even eighteen months after she had joined them, Maria wasn’t sold on her. Three people on board a ship should have training and qualification, the doctor, the captain, and the navigator. The loss of their last navigator in the mess with the Royal Navy still hurt. Melinda had been her closest friend from childhood, she had understood Maria when no one else in their village had. The outcasts amongst outcasts, they had run away together.

“Where are we?” She demanded.

Skye jumped.

Getting a good look at the girl, Maria almost felt bad about startling her. Dark circles under exhausted eyes reminded her that no matter what she thought of the girl, she had been through just a rough a night as the rest of them.

“About 20 miles south of I don’t fucking know.” She shoved at the layers of maps and weights and chalk sticks off the raised slab of decking that acted as her table.

Maria had to skip back a step to avoid a bouncing ball of heavy glass that threatened to break her foot. She scowled at the young woman until she muttered a petulant apology and started gathering up the precious charts.

Dumping the armful on the table, she dropped herself onto a thick coil of ropes, boneless across her makeshift seat. Looking up at Maria, Skye started talking again.

“The prevailing winds during the storm was South-West.” She wavered a hand in the air. “Guessing, I reckon we are somewhere North-East of Madeira. We have a few options, sail in circles till I can calculate where we are, sail directly East and figure out our latitude from which section of coast we hit first, or sail West and hope I’m not completely off on where I think we are and that we are close enough to be able to see one of the Canaries.” Dropping her hand, she shrugged awkwardly and settled in.

Making the decision wasn’t her role, she just needed to let them know they had options. It was up to Maria, Marcus, or Phil to decide. Nodding stiffly she turned away. Phil was out of action and Marcus had only just given over the crew, she was loath to wake him for this. Gazing out over the choppy, grey waves thinking it through. She wasn’t going to sail aimlessly into the sunset, the chances of them being further off-course than Skye thought was too great and without Clint in his nest they might miss the tiny specks of land. Heading East toward the mainland was risky as well. Too far North and they would not find any friends, too far south they would hit uninhabited Desert which looked like any other patch of uninhabited Desert and they would be no better off. In fact, they would be days worth of food and water worse off.

As much as she believed Skye needed another decade added to her age to be in the role she had, Maria wasn’t so blind that she couldn’t see how good she was at her job. Turning, she saw that Skye hadn’t been sitting unoccupied while Maria had been turning over the choices. The charts and maps were spread as close to neatly as ever across the table, paperweights of scraps of metal and glass chunks and a single shiny rock sat at the corners of the papers.

Lent over the papers, she was scribbling on the slate she kept for her calculations. Her notes unreadable to anyone else on the ship, the strokes of chalk the signs and symbols of her home. Maria wasn’t sure if she was amused or annoyed that Skye had pre-empted her decision.

“I don’t know what you are going to do.” Skye said, not looking up from her scratches. “But only one choice actually needs me to do anything, so figured I would get on with it.”

“Keep at it.” Maria confirmed the order.

“Yes boss.” Skye saluted lazily, a smirk completely ruining the effect.

She glared a little bit more before stalking off, Triplet was being a little too loud up at the bow where he was meant to be working. The piles of sail and rope and timber allowed her to get close to the laughing man.

“...he stumbled out the door right? Directly into the woman. She was knocked down and started yelling, then he was yelling, and then the guy with her was yelling. By which point the whole fucking street had stopped to watch right.” 

Davis has started to chortle as Trip talked. That is until he met Maria’s eye, the mirth instantly drained from his face. Triplet was too caught up in his story to notice. Gesturing widely as he reached the climax of his story.

“And which were you?” Maria asked, getting immense satisfaction from the almost foot of height Trip gained as he startled at her voice. “The guy stumbling out of the door, the guy yelling, or one of the idiot bystanders?”

He eyed her wearily. Did she actually want a response or was she being facetious. Blandly staring back she didn’t give him any help in working it out. She could play either as the wrong choice and enjoy watching him squirm.

“None?” He asked.

“Are you asking or telling?”

“Telling? Telling.” Stumbling over the simple word, he managed to get it out definitively the second time.

“And why are you telling?”

“Because you… you asked?” Trip knew he had walked himself into something, he just wasn’t sure what or when it was going to bite him on the ass.

The tolling of the warning bell interrupted them. A single long and a single short ripped through the air. Great, just what they needed. An English Navy ship, another short, coming from the East, and three short. They must have just come over the horizon.

“ACTION STATIONS!” She bellowed.

The bells on the deck took up a warning toll. Long peals of brass echoing between the forest of masts. Already busier than usual, as the crew worked to right the storm damage, the deck went from busy to swarming. People pouring out of the hatches. Squad captains diving for the sealed barrels of arms.

It was busy but organised. She could see dark circles under a few people’s eyes. Fighting through the crowd, she inched her way back to the helm. Passing the hatch closest to the helm, she exchanged quick nods with Clint as he scrambled up the ladder on the heel of Elmsworth, bow and quiver over his shoulder. She didn’t see him go, but knew he was getting one of the best long arms off Koenig to complete his armament and then climbing up to join Mount and use the high ground to pick off officers if they weren’t able to outrun the other ship.

All of the original crew preferred to leave at least the English Navy well enough alone if they could. A mixed-up sense of still being beholden to their home, and not wanting to make themselves any more of a target than they already were. Although, Maria thought that if any of them had any sense, they would have set sail for the Americas and chosen themselves little patched of terra firma to farm and live quiet, unassuming lives. Luckily she had as little sense as the rest of the crew.

A shark’ grin bared her teeth as she thought about the coming chase and possible battle.

“That’s discomforting,” Marcus informed her as she finally managed to free herself from the scrum of people and join him. Unsurprisingly he had beat her to the deck. The crew were wary of her, they were downright scared of him and no one on the crew except Phillip held their respect in the same way.

“Yes sir.” She agreed easily.

His own grin matched hers. “Close haul the sails!” He bellowed.

Leaving her on the upper deck, he bulled down into the scrambling crowd, pushing and pulling people to get them moving in the right direction. The wood jumped under her feet as the wind, still gusting from the storm, filled and caught the sails, billowing them out to full. Immense swathes of grey canvas stretched to its limited as it made the ‘SHIELD fly. As she moved past, Skye handed her a telescope. Murmuring a thanks, Maria brought the glass to her eye, cold brass tightening the skin of her face. The ship that Mount had seen looked to have gained on them slightly. It was impossible to tell yet which way the chase would go, but their sails were at full and they had turned to start playing cat.

With their own sails set, the crew at the ready to manage the thousand minute changes that were required to walk the razorblade that would save them there was nothing left to do but wait.

= + =

The thin frisson of tension and fear that accompanied the minutes, and hours of waiting for something to change, for violence to burst into surreal life or the white sails of danger to disappear behind the loving blue curve of the ocean wound the threads of memories to the surface.

They had been in port at Tenerife. The island had been gifted to the British crown when King George had married a Spanish Princess. Maria wasn’t interested in court intrigue, it was one of the reasons she had left her family property and name to join the Royal Navy, but her sister told her the marriage was not a happy one and if the Queen left to return to Spain, the island would probably go with her. For now though, it was a useful port.

A need for fresh supplies had pulled them off the water. Maybe twelve hours on land and then they would be back out to sea, their route was meant to send them far North and then to sing East over the top of Scotland. 

Maria was lounging at the stern watching the dock workers loading up the nets attached to the SHIELD’s pulley system. It would take them the better part of three hours to haul everything on board, but then they wouldn’t have to come in to shore for months. Most of the crew was off exploring the town, more than a few of them probably partaking of the… local sights. It wasn’t something she was interested in for herself, or even in thinking about. Instead she was quite happy to continue sitting there soaking up the warm morning sunlight. The calls of the workers and the squalling of gulls lulling her into a doze. 

Her first indication that not all was a calm as it seemed was Marcus thumping his way back up the gangway, the deep timber of his voice booming through the very wood of the vessel. Snapping out of her nap, she was moving before her eyes were open. Phillip had appeared from the far corner of the ship where he, Barton and Romanov had been playing cards, and Pierce had popped out of the hatch closest to the officer’s quarters. Maria didn’t like the older man, but he was the officer she reported to during the nightwatch and she would do her duty.

“There were orders waiting.” He growled to the three of them.

Only something catastrophic could put that look on his face. Maria wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

“Phillip, get into town and round up the crew, we’re sailing the second we can pull up the gangway. Pierce, go and get the dock workers moving, we will leave behind any supplies that aren’t aboard and they can explain it to the harbourmaster. Hill, get whoever is still aboard to get us ready to sail.

Everyone moved quickly, Phillip collecting up Barton and Romanoff, the three of them quickly disappearing into the maze of streets. She could hear Pierce and Whitehall yelling instructions, insults and threats at the men loading their food which Maria thought was a bad idea. Marcus was leant over the maps with Smithson plotting their course to whatever disaster awaited them. She didn’t actually have to do much, the crew were well enough trained and relatively rested after two months of sailing between the Canaries and the uncivilised Kong Empire on the West coast of Africa.

For twenty minutes they swirled, a well choreographed dance that had them sailing out of the large harbour before the hour was over with ninety percent of their stores and a hundred percent of their crew, although Triplett was running it close to be back aboard.

Expecting to start swinging north soon after leaving the harbour, Maria glanced back at Smithson and Marcus when they just continued heading straight East. For an hour they sailed out until the harbour was well over the horizon and it would be two days sail until the African coast came into view.

“Drop anchor. Gather the whole crew on deck.” Fury bellowed over the low-level hum of conversation and hisses and thumps of a ship at full sail.

The crew jumped too. They worked with the exacting efficiency that the Royal Navy required, no slackers kept on board here. Maria was one of them. Sliding down the ladder into the bowels of the ship were her people were trying to catch a few minutes of shut-eye before dusk and their shift. A few of them grumbled as they tipped themselves out of their hammocks and stuffed feet into boots. It didn’t last long. A few well placed words and a reminder of the chain of command had them moving past her silently.

Under the glare of the summer sun reaching its zenith, the crew of the Empire’s Shield filled every inch of free deck space.

“We received orders from the ambassador this morning. The Spanish Governor asked for assistance and his request was granted.” Fury started.

So far, it wasn’t anything Maria found alarming, or needing a hundred men and women to be cramped and sweating in the sun.

“I disagree with the orders as given.”

A wave of murmurs and questions broke over the crew.

“The town of Tabaiba has reported a single case of Plague, we have been ordered to burn it out. I will not kill innocents!” Fury thundered.

The wave turned into a tsunami. People yelling and shouting. In the chaos, Maria could hear some arguing for and others against.

“No.” Stevenson called. His voice booming over everyone else. A bell toll of destiny. “We do our duty.” The Navigator had always been unbending and Maria didn’t see this as being any different.

“I’m not gonna be part of killing a bunch of people.” Clint Barton, the crew’s newest member spoke. Normally he kept to himself, spending his down time playing poker with the weapon’s master and Coulson. The few times he had spoken, people had seemed to listen.

“This isn’t a democracy. We are a Ship of His Majesty’s Royal Navy. We have a duty and we will carry it out.” Stevenson bit back.

“You’re right, this isn’t a democracy. And I’m in charge.” Fury shut them both down. “We are going to Tabaiba, evaccing the population. Anyone who doesn’t like it can stay behind.”

= + =

Nothing had been the same. A full third of the crew had been left on the white sands of Tabaiba at sunset and a hundred villagers with the few belongings they could stuff into bags in a hour were crowded below deck, and on deck, and in every spare bit of space they could find. It had taken them days to figure out where to take them, but finally a tract of land on the edge of the world has seen the beginning of a hundred new lives.

In a few days, Maria’s whole life had changed, but it wasn’t a change she regretted.

“I think we are gaining some breathing room.” Sky spoke from beside her, jolting her from her thoughts. Looking around, Maria saw she had been joined by the new Navigator and Jemma.

Searching the horizon for a sail, she smiled down at the two younger women. “I think you’re right.”


	5. Tony

Anthony Stark ruled over his little kingdom with an iron fist. Or at least that’s what he liked to tell himself. In reality, his cousin Virginia was the Empress of their kingdom. She ran the small blacksmith’s shop and the small home they lived in seamlessly. His sphere of influence ended at the soot blackened threshold of the smithy and when he was feeling particularly pensive or extremely drunk he would even admit it to himself.

On cooler nights he missed their home in Tabaiba, they had had a good thing going there and sometimes a warm body to fight off the cold. Here he only had the roaring flames of his work, the icy-silver stars, and Pepper’s everything. 

The early hours of one of those cold nights was drawing to a close. Soon the gold and red of the dawn would burn off the pensive mood.

“Out here all night?” Pepper shuffled out onto the couple of planks they had put in front of their door as a small verandah. She was wrapped in the woolen blanket her mother had made for her before she had died. 

“Yep.” He smirked up at her, trying to play it off.

The glare he was met with let him know exactly how much she wasn’t buying it.

“Couldn’t sleep.” He admitted, letting his eyes drop to the horizon. “What’s that?” Shading his eyes with an ash smeared hand he squinted to see against the quickly rising sun.

“Don’t try and change the subject.” She grumbled, hitting his shoulder lightly to try and get him to focus back on her.

“No. There!” He pointed at a smudge of white he was sure was a sail. But there was somethjjing wrong, boats weren’t his thing, but he was sure they weren’t meant to be sitting that low and  _ lurching _ .

“Is that the Shield?” Pepper was standing straight next to him, blanket dropped to the ground forgotten.

“I dunno. How would I know?” 

= + =

Between the time Tony and Pepper left their slightly sprawled cottage and made it to the beach, the ship had come much closer and it wasn’t the Shield. Stopping on the short dock that was still silvery in its newness, he could see the markings on their sails and the distinctive gruesome figurehead.

“That’s the Hydra’s Curse.” Tony grabbed Pepper’s elbow and pulled her quickly into movement. Pushing her slightly to the left, he went right hammering his fist on the wood of every door and wall he passed, shouting at those few already awake. “Hydra’s Curse. Get out!” He spread through town, too slowly hearing the warning call being taken up, they didn’t have a town bell of any sort they could ring, but Tony knew the second Bruce was awake, his rumbling roar echoing across the small valley the town occupied.

A steady stream of people clothed in shawls and jackets thrown over bedclothes moved into the hills around them, a small cave system that was almost impossible to find unless you already knew it was there would be their refuge, it had served them twice before in storms but this would be its first test against humans intent on harm. Over the course of months and years, they had put aside rations of water, food and the few medicines they could spare. 

Tony, Reed Richards, and Bruce rolled and moved a pile of stones into the entrance once everyone was in. Hopefully, it would give that extra bit of protection that could see them from total annihilation.

Tense silence settled over the complete blackness. A single, thin cry of one of the babies was quickly shushed in a desperate mother’s entrity. Time stopped having meaning, no sun or stars to mark the passage of the hours, no light laughing conversation to see the minutes tripping over themselves, no soft smiles to fill the dragging seconds.

“Do you think…” Richards whispered into Tony’s ear uncomfortably. An echoing boom stopped the question before it could be asked.

“No.” He didn’t know what the question was, but was 99.9% certain of his answer.

He could feel the baker’s glare as he shuffled away in the darkness, muffling a curse when he slammed what sounded like his shin into a rock.

= + =

The sun was kissing the horizon when the first villager ventured outside of their earthly protection. They hadn’t been found by the invaders and the thump and boom of destruction had petered off hours ago.

Smoke hung thick across the valley, obscuring the town and the beach beyond. The crushing oppression of a funeral procession blanketed everything that the smoke didn’t deaded. Stressed beyond being able to comprehend what they were seeing, the people crept back into what had only been their home for a few short years. Every second building was damaged in some way, for some it was just a broken window or doors, for others it was almost complete distruction.

They moved through the destruction like ghosts searching for the pier across the River Styx. Slowly the crowd disappeared, each of them breaking off to check on what was left of the lives they had been working so hard to rebuild.

Tony was again stood on the small bit of deck in front of their cottage, watching his neighbours. Behind him, the cottage door was hanging off the hinges and the screens over every window were ripped or missing. He didn’t yet have the heart to check the smithy, it would have been one of the main placed looted, along with Bruce’s tavern, Richard’s bakery and every other source of food the invaders could find. The precious metals he used sparingly for those few special projects were hidden deep with the cottage, a lockbox inside a small hole behind one of the kitchen cabinets was as secure as he could make it. Pepper was checking, her steely strength allowing her to do the things he just couldn’t face.

“They didn’t get it.” Her voice was low, a whisper of shaped breath more than true sounds.

They had rebuilt before, but Tony didn’t think it would be as easy as last time. They had thought they were safe here, free from King and Country and the petty swabbles that constantly engulfed both.

= + =

Three days later a new sail appeared on the horizon. Sue was the first to see it, a ragged square of white creeping its way closer to their little home. Tony stood on the short dock and watched as the crew worked to put down the anchor on the bedgraggled ship. Two of the fishermen had taken their little coastal rigs out to see what had happened. It wasn’t the usual fanfair the ‘Shield got, but the townspeople were too engrossed with trying to put their own lives back together. Tony was only taking the time to watch the hulking ship because he had been surrounded by the heat of the smithy since well before dawn making new… everythings… to replace the broken ironwork and stolen homewares, and had needed a break and fresh air before his lungs actually started crisping in his chest.

There would be more faces in the damaged tavern that night, maybe with news. Turning from the gleaming water, he returned to work. It would be hours before he could truely step away from his fire and nothing much would happen until sunset anyway.

Ears filled with the ringing of metal on metal, he missed the heavy footsteps that stopped on his threshold. Noone with any sense interrupted a smithy at work. it was one of the things Tony most loved about his job, the freedom from the social interactions that were such a large part of most other occupations, and he was lucky enough that Pepper took care of most of those that he couldn’t avoid.

Dropping the glowing sheet of metal that was going to be new door hinges, into the slacking bucket, he turned to the presence at his back. He hadn’t heard them, but he had felt their approach.

“Hill?” The Shield’s night watchman wasn’t who he had been expecting. With the state of the ship, he had expected Fury or Coulson at the least.

“Fury is with Banner, and Coulson is laid-up.” She explained succinctly.

He hadn’t interracted with her much, she rarely came ashore and he had only spoken to her once or maybe twice on their flight from Tenerife.

“He okay?” Tony asked off-handedly, pretending that he didn’t care about the snarky First-Mate. He wasn’t fooling either of them.

“He will be. We took some damage.” 

His snort earned him a disapproving glare, but what was she expecting, it was pretty fucking obvious.

“What do you need? It’s gonna have to wait either way, you’re not the only ones hurting.”

A line drawn in the sand they got to business.

= + =

“Who is that?” Tony asked when he stepped out of the gloom of the night and into the barely brighter interior of Bruce’s domain.

Beside him Hill smirked. “Our newest crew member, Steve Rogers. I think he has something going with him though.” She nodded at the dark haired man beside the blond god.

“We’ll see.” Tony pasted his sexiest smirk on to his face and swayed his way across the room. Leaning against the gleaming dark wood beside the man who had caught his eye, he lifted a finger to Bruce to order his drink. A mug of ale almost black in colour was dropped roughly in front of him as the barkeep hustled past. “Hello gorgeous.” He purred when the man glanced at him.

Instantly a rush of blood stained the man’s cheeks rosy and his clear, blue eyes flicked away and down. Oh there was something there, he hadn’t missed the subtle sweep of Tony from head to foot as he averted his eyes.

Let the games begin.


	6. Natasha

Natasha slipped into the bed beside Nick. He had disappeared into his cabin hours earlier, but she had stayed with Clint in his silent vigil over Phillip, only leaving when Skye arrived. All of the crew cared about the first mate, but she cared more about Clint and the dark circles under his eyes that were growing worse by the hour.

“How are they?” Nick rumbled into the darkness.

She felt the sound against her cheek where it had come to rest against his broad chest. She shrugged but remained silent, unwilling to allow her worry out into the world, the superstitions she had grown up with still deeply entrenched in her psyche.

“They’ll be okay.”

Where did he get the unfailing confidence from? It wasn’t a belief in some higher power watching over them. Too much had happened for most of them to hold on to any sort of religion.

“Maybe.” She whispered.

He rolled them slightly so that he was leaning over her, the length of his much larger body pressing her deep into the thick, down mattress one of the luxuries he got as Captain. Softly he fit his lips to hers and then pulled away. “Clint will be fine.” He tried to reassure her.

The distraction he was offering would work better than empty words. She surged up to meet him again, fiery intent behind her movement that hadn’t been there when he had kissed her, but he responded quickly.

= + =

Surrounded by boxes of shot, barrels of arrows and bolts, racks full of finely honed swords, Natasha felt safe. Something she found sparingly in her life. Even in bed with Nick, a part of her was still on edge, too many lovers had hurt her in the past to trust the man she had given her heart to.

She had spent a comfortable hour checking over every piece of hardwear in the armoury and was satisfied in what she had found. The had managed to avoid the Royal warship and using their carefully stockpiled weaponry, but Nick was intent on going after Pierce, to teach them that the people of Tabaiba were off limits and any damage done to them would be taken out twice on whoever had brought them harm. The ‘Shield hadn’t turned their backs on their oaths on a whim.

After almost a week at shore to help the town recovery, do their own repairs and let Phil heal, the crew were itching to see their sails filled again. Nick planned to sail out with the tide that dusk and it would be her last chance to get anything repaired or replaced before heading into what would be a hard battle.

Satisfied that they were as ready as they could be, she left the dark room to give her report. WIth only one small window to illuminate the room and the danger of bringing flame into the room to great, her eyes stung when she stepped out into the comparably glaring light of the crews’ sleeping quarter. 

She easily found Nick, he was in the open air of the swoop deck bent over the navigation table with Skye, Maria, and a barely upright Phil. She knew Clint would be close by, ready to jump-to if Phil faltered the slightest bit, but she couldn’t see him.

“All set.” It was to the point and sparse of the detail she would have had to give if they were still wearing insignia, but they weren’t and none of them cared if there were 500 or 550 shots, they took her at her words that they were as prepared as they could be. Her life was just as much on the line if they weren’t as the rest of them.

“Thank you.” Phil smiled tiredly at her.

Nodding at the group she left again. Halfway down the stairs she caught sight of Clint’s blonde hair behind a stack of rope and went to join him, their jobs done until the ship was jumping with the waves beneath her again.

= + =

Out beyond sight of land, it was easy to fall into a rhythm of life. Each day looking very similar to the next. It would be easy to assume they had lost their way and were sailing in endless circles, or that tey would never find their quarry. But Skye could read the stars better than anyone Natasha had ever met, and Nick _knew_ Pierce, they had come up together in the Royal Navy. He knew how he thought and where he preferred to berth. The lawless lands of southern Morroco allowed lawless men to disappear amongst their fellows. 

Normally, they avoided even sailing too close, unwilling to make a target of themselves, and uninterested in the people that mostly dwelt there. This time was different, they were actively sailing into a fight that they all hoped they would come out of mostly unharmed. They had a good crew, better equipment, and a faster ship. It shouldn't be too much of a competition, but there was always something that could go wrong. 

Natasha glared unseeing at the distant horizon. Versions of the coming fight rolling through her mind, looking for vulnerabilities both on the Shield, but also the Curse. They had one advantage, they knew the Shield. Not just the type of ship she was, but all of her tiny idiosyncrasies. They couldn’t say the same. She knew the style of ship and the areas of weakness they had when they rolled out of the shipyard, but she had no concept of any changes they might have made, except she knew how her counterpart thought. He would have added extra board and metal sheeting between their cannon, Rumlow preferred strength to speed, yet another reason they had never gotten along.

“Natasha?” It was one of the new crewmen. Steve and James, but she didn’t know them well enough to guess which of them, hadn’t had time to learn their voices or their tread. Normally yes, but so much of her focus had been on keeping Clint together until Phillip was back up and about her mind had been elsewhere.

“Yes?” It was the blonde one.

He came and stood beside her at the rail, leaving a good foot of space between them. Good boy.

“How is Coulson doing?” Absently he rubbed his shoulder, in the same place as Coulson had been stabbed. It endeared him enough to her that she would answer, his concern real.

“As well as he could.” There was no sarcasm in her words. She had been asked a straight question and would give a straight answer. Even ashore in one of the world’s largest cities he would not have been doing better. Maybe in a hundred years, or a thousand he would be even better, but not in the time they lived in.

“Good. Can you pass on our well wishes? We, I. Um. didn’t want to get in the way.”

“Of course.”

“Thanks.” He left her alone as quickly as he had appeared.

= + =

Small atolls that were little more than sandbanks that had managed to stick their heads out of the water broke up the high waves. Bursts of white foam marking the smaller ones. Natasha helped Woo and Davis lash one of the top deck cannons into place, the original rope had almost frayed through.

A curt nod at the two men once they were done and they all scattered, a never ending list of work to be done. Her next stop was the rest of the cannon, making sure there were no other fraying ropes, or that water had gotten into the fuse boxes, or a hundred other problems that if left unaddressed could cost lives. 

Stopping twice more, once for one of the cannons and once to scramble up the rigging to help Piper pull in one of the short sails. It took her an hour to circle the ship. A drink of water, and she would be on the move again. 

A boom and splash echoed across the choppy waves, water flying high enough to almost reach the crow’s nest. Instinct had Natasha squatting below the railing and turning towards the noise. Peeking over the railing a white sail appeared from behind the closest atoll, it was bigger than the others with just enough trees to create cover for a ship. It was more an island than an uppity sandbank.

She was already moving when the second explosion of black powder and iron ripped through their foresail. The pause of confusion was wiped away from the rest of the crew and they were following her before the canvas of the ruined sail had fluttered to the deck.

“Firing parties to their posts!” She shoved someone out of her way and towards the closest cannon where Davis and Percy were struggling to get the ball in alone. “Doc, get below,” Jemma was scrambling at the shout, running and tripping over herself to get to one of the hatches. “Skye.”

“On it.” Skye was following her lover.

From hte other end of the ship, she could hear Fury booming orders.

A third cannon ball missed them by yards. Falling slightly behind them. The other ship had underestimated their speed. Most people did. She took another quick glance at the attacking vessel, she didn’t recognise the markings, but the style was from northern Europe, Denmark or maybe even Sweden. A hull thickened to deal with winter sea ice would also keep out a lot of weapons fire.

A louder boom joined the cacophony of shouts and thuds and echoing explosions. Their own cannon joining the fight.

Natasha stopped counting the shots exchanged, focusing in on the firing teams at her end of the ship, Fury was at the other and Maria and Phil would have the people below in hand. They were a deadly team, getting three cannon off to every two of the attackers. But it wasn’t enough to stop the attack, and a slow but steady accumulation of damage. She had just sent a six pound ball of iron through their mizzen mast when a blood chilling scream erupted from the other end of the ship. She couldn’t not look, her heart stood exposed. Glancing over, Fury’s dark, looming figure was still standing strong and a small group, she couldn’t see how many from this far away, scrambled around someone prone on the deck, their screams dwindling as shock took over.

Clint had reached the crow’s nest, finally. A flaming arrow tracing an arcing line through the evening sky setting their main sail alight. Another and another and another, each one hitting its target and lighting up precious sails and rope and in one spectacular shot a barrel of gunpowder that would have burnt a hole right through their deck if their crew hadn’t abandoned three of their cannon to dump sand and sea water on the flames.

The breathing room the archer gave the Shield allowed them to take out the other ships rudder and start running. The other ship wasn’t going to be going anywhere any time soon.


	7. Jemma

Her small cabin was always pristine. Having finally convinced Skye that as it was also her work space, and a doctor’s office needed to be clean at all times, the other woman had started putting her precious few belongings away instead of leaving them lying about. It had been the only problem in their relationship so far and easily solved.

The other woman followed her in, and a quartet of men were behind her. There wasn’t enough room in the small space to accommodate them all, but three of the men left quickly. In the three second head start she had on the rest of them, she had pulled the low table out from under their bunk as threw half a bottle of alcohol over the wood, cleaning it as quickly and ruthlessly as she could. Carr and Woo dropped James onto the table and got out quickly. Steve lingered, watching as Jemma and Skye scrambled around the room, pulling medical supplies out of every nook and cranny in the room. A bundle of bandages out of one small cupboard, a pack of needle and thread came from a basket in the bottom of the clothes press, and five bottles of alcohol from five different places.

“Steve. I either need you to get out or help.” Jemma ordered, throwing him a [word] of ropes. “Tie him down.” She pointed at James’ chest, legs, and undamaged arm.

“This is going to suck.” Sky added unnecessarily.

Jemma set out a row of knives and the needles on the bed, pouring the second half of the first bottle over the metal.

“Get the candles.”

Skye dived under the bed, emerging with a thick candle in each hand, the wick in each of them so much thicker than any normal candle. Setting the candles on the small box by the bed, Skye dived back under the bed. This time she emerged with a glass bottle well wrapped in layers of fabric, first cotton and then silk.

Wiggling the stopped out, she dribbled a thin red liquid into James’ open mouth. He coughed, sending it all out the sides of his mouth, staining his skin. “You need to drink. James. Look at me! You need to drink!”

The injured man groaned, but complied. Taking a mouthful of the sweet smelling concoction.

“Good. Another.” Skye indicated Steve forward to hold the injured man’s mouth open and still.

The second mouthful went down easier, and the third disappeared without a problem. James blinking up at the three of them as sleep overcame him.

“Ready?” Jemma asked as she ran the wicked looking curved blade through the thick flames of the smoking candles.

The blade was glowing in her hand.

“Ready.” Two voices chimed behind her.

Turning, she began cutting. Pressing heavily on the blade, flesh and blood sizzled where it came in contact with the over-heated metal. 

She worked fast enough to only need to stop to reheat once before she hit bone. A clean flap of skin left in the wake of her knife. The saw appeared in her hand like magis, but most likely passed to her by Skye. The broken, raw edge of the bone was efficiently removed. Carefully stretching the skin flap into place, she sewed it shut. Sealing the open wound.

“Skye, can you?” Jemma stumbled back, landing half on the bed. Her legs shaking from the comedown of the adrenalin and the sound taste of fear in her mouth, and the copper tang of blood in her nose.

Already thankful for having met Skye, just for the person she was. The addition of the herb-law her mother had passed down was a god send. She didn’t enjoy causing pain, and the mixture of wine and herbs that had put him out, and would keep him out for a day at least made treatment so much easier. It had allowed her to save the Captain when he had lost his eye at the end of Pierce’s sword, and would allow her to save James from the loss of his arm.

“Sit Jem. Here.” Skye pressed an opened bottle of the good schnapps into Jemma’s hand. She had picked up a taste for it in Germany when she was training and only pulled it out when she really needed the strength to face something insurmountable. “I got him.” Skye dropped a kiss on the corner of her mouth and went back to work, cotton unravelling easily and neatly around the stub that had once been an arm.

For the first time since the cannonball had landed, ripping through the newest crew member, she looked at the injury, thought about the damage that had been done. The ball of iron and lead had shattered the elbow and everything below it, forcing her to cut halfway up the upper arm. His functionality would be limited, but as long as she kept infection at bay he would be fine.

“Thank you.” The soft words made her jump. In the haze of the adrenal crash, she had forgotten that there was another person in the room with them.

Blinking owlishly up at the tall man, it took her seconds longer than it should have to remember who he was, why he was there. Steve, James’ best friend. Of course he would be there and be worried.

“You’re welcome. Would you help us move him somewhere more comfortable? He will be out for a while?” While true, it had the added benefit of giving him something productive to do.

“Of course.”

= + =

A low moan filled the silent cabin. The unconscious sounds of an animal in pain. Visceral and heart wrenching. Jemma put aside the book she had been reading by the barest bit of light that managed to sneak through the small port window. She had been sitting with James for a day and a half, only leaving him to go and check on First Mate Coulson in the next cabin over, but Clint was with him now and would let her know if she was needed there.

For now, she could see to James. Checking him from top to toe, she found he was running a slight fever. Nothing she wasn’t expecting. Sticking her head out of the cabin, she saw Davis lautering in the main cabin.

“Davis!” She called out to the man.

“Yes Doc?” He stepped into the entrance to the short hallways, none of the crew liked coming down into the area where the officer cabins were if they could help it.

“Can you go and get me some of the fresh cold water?” There were barrell of water spread throughout the ship, but those in the depths were always cold. 

“Yes ma’am.” He disappeared from sight.

Another moan drew her back into her cabin. On the bed, James was blinking groggily in the dim light.

“Wha..happend..?” He slurred. “Urg…AH!” He had tried to push himself up with his injured arm.

“Stop! Here.” Hooking a hand in his armpit, she helped him shuffle up and back until he was sitting against the bulkhead. 

Clearing his throat, he asked again, “What happened?”

“We were attacked two days ago. One of the cannonballs hit you.”

“What?” He intercepted, a look of complete shock and disbelief on his face. “How am I alive? What?” He finally, actively, noticed the pristine bandage wrapped around what used to be his arm.

“The cannon didn’t hit you directly. Rather, it hit your arm. I’m so sorry James.” She stood awkwardly at his side, wringing her hands. She didn’t have any words of comfort. “Can I um, can I get you anything?” She winced at herself.

Someone rapped a knuckle against the wood around her open door “Doc?” Davis asked.

“Thank you Davis.” She accepted the full jug from him and closed the door. Giving James a sliver of privacy to start to wrap his head around the massive change to his body that had happened while he was unconscious.

Quietly, she carefully made her way around the cabin, getting herself organised and giving him some space. Pouring a mug of water and wetting down a cloth, she couldn’t put it off any longer. He was still staring down at the stump of his arm, in the long minutes she had kept herself occupied he hadn’t moved. Barely breathing, barely blinking.

“James?” She took a half step forward. “James, I have some water for you. You have a bit of a fever.”

Finally looking up at her, his eyes were baleful, lost. Unthinking she held the water out to him and unthinking he reached out, the stump ending far short of grasping the water.

Blushing crimson, he pulled his arm back into his body, cradling his injury close.

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry.” She shifted backward, mortified at herself. Dropping the water on the table behind her, she turned to flee.

“It’s okay Doc.” His voice was rough but sure. Stopping her in her tracks. “Some water would be great.” His uninjured hand was reaching out for the mug.

“Of, of course.” A good inch of the water had splashed over the side when she had dropped it, a puddle still spreading.

Re-filling it she held it out to him again.

“Thanks.” He drank deeply, draining the cup.

She watched his throat work, gulping the cool fluid. Realising what she was doing, she hurriedly busied herself cleaning up the spilt water. Eyes burning with guilty tears, and face burning with embarrassment.

“I’ll be right back.” Slipping from the room, she didn’t look back at him before she left.

Skye was in the first place she looked for her. The other woman had been sleeping in a hammock in the main cabin while James had been in their bed. Jemma had been snatching what sleep she could in the small armchair they had wrestled into the small space.

Lent over her maps and charts, Jemma stopped to admire her. The golden sunrise was streaking her hair in hues of caramel and cream. Her heart beat a little faster watching her. She loved Skye. She knew that. With certainty restored the embarrassment and guilt from the stuffy cabin waned.

“Hey gorgeous.” Skye called, dark eyes sparkling as she saw Jemma lingering at the bottom of the stairs.

Bouncing down the wooden stairs, she dropped a quick kiss on Jemma’s lips.

“How’s your patient?” Leaning against the railing, she watched Jemma with eyes almost as sharp as Clint’s. She didn’t miss Jemma’s tiny flinch. “Jem? What’s going on?” Standing straight and putting herself well inside Jemma’s personal space, she wouldn’t let her look away. “You’re worrying me. Is James okay?”

“Ye..yes.” Jemma had to clear her throat before she could force the answer out. “He, um, he just woke up. Seems to be doing okay.”

Dark eyes just grew more concerned. They both knew Jemma wouldn’t leave a patient alone if she had any question about them being okay and certainly not when they had just woken up after surgery.

“He. He’s very. Um.” Jemma finally gave in, shrugging in discomfort.

“He's very attractive? Yes. I had noticed. It’s okay if you did too.” Skye made the correct leap to what was sending the other woman into such a state. Slowly, Skye drew her in, until they were pressed against each other, collarbone to knee. “It’s okay.” She whispered, willing to repeat it as many times as she needed to.

Jemma tucked her face into Skye’s neck and breathed deeply. The scent of open air and jasmine tea mixed with sea salt and sweat salt.

“Back to work.” Jemma ordered them both with a wry smile when she eventually pulled away.


	8. Steve

Slowly, James healed even as the ship searched for a berth to heal itself. Steve stopped lurking outside the good doctor’s cabin after his best friend, his brother woke and didn’t come apart from the loss of his arm.

Oh, he was there. There to help change bandages and wash and feed his brother. But, Bucky’s scowl when he thought Steve had spent too much time hovering still had the power to send the blonde man running for the hills. Unfortunately there weren’t any hills to run to an a ship. In the end he settled for working, the damaged ship needed every able hand to keep her limping forward.

Coming and going from the Doc’s cabin, he had overheard Captain Fury in the First Mate’s Cabin, Coulson Steve reminded himself of the injured man’s name, talking late into the night trying to decide on the Shield’s best chance of finding what she needed to make the repairs. The argument for and against civilisation raging backwards and forwards. Each man shooting down one option after another.

He had happily left them to it. He and Bucky had been new to Tenerfe, only having left their berth with a Mediteranean ship a few months before joining the Shield, and he didn’t have any suggestions on the geography out in the Atlantic.

When he wasn’t working, or ‘mother henning’ Bucky, his words not Steve’s, Steve climbed into the crow’s nest and watched the horizon, the slow rise and dip of the deck amplified at the new height. 

Mount wasn’t very welcoming, barely glancing at Steve when he joined him. Barton, Clint was happier to chatter. Sharing lighthearted stories of his own youth with a travelling circus or his early days with the Royal Navy. Steve noticed Clint talking around people or events every now and again but was happy to let the other man have his secrets. Didn’t they all? He didn’t think anyone ended up on a pirate’s ship who didn’t have a few skeletons in the depths of their mind or their soul.

On one memorable occasion, with a lightening storm flashing on the starboard horizon, Natasha the weapon’s master had joined Clint and him. The tiny woman had an aura about her that sent Steve as tongue tied as he had been as a 90 pound asmatic when faced with a beautiful woman. She had grinned a shark’s grin at him and spent an hour ‘teaching’ him Russian. Mostly by swearing at him or chatting with Clint, the look-out kindly translating for him.

= + =

On the morning of the fourth day after the attack, Steve ventured out onto deck. Bucky and already shooed him out of the Doc’s cabin, assuring him he was in capable hands, and seeing Mount on duty he kept his feet planted on the wood.

The landscape of the ocean had changed since he had gone under two hours ago after his shift to try and catch a little sleep. Instead of the endless waves, topped by foaming white, there was a small dot of green speckled sand. Without any other reference, or knowing where they were, it could be a tiny island close by, or a huge landmass still a fair distance off.

“Isla de los fantasmas” Skye said, making him jump. “Capt’n thinks we will find what we need there. Mostly.” She continued, ignoring his involuntary movement. 

“Isle de los fantasmas?” He carefully sounded the words out.

“Ghost Island. Or Island of the Ghosts. Either way. No one lives there and most people avoid it on account of it being haunted and all.” She shrugged unconcerned. “I’m just glad I don’t have to go ashore.”

“You believe it’s haunted?” He asked, surprised. In the short time Steve had known her, the young woman had seemed firmly entrenched in science with little patience for the unexplained.

“Better safe than sorry.” Her words were off-hand, uncaring. But after a second the tension went out of her shoulders and she slumped. “I didn’t used to. Neither did my parents, and they broke a pretty big taboo in our traditions the day before the storm hit. Now. Better safe than sorry.” She said again, more firmly this time.

No words could take back what she had been through, and empty condolences were useless and often grating. Instead, he rested a wide hand on her shoulder in comfort. Leaving it there until she shrugged it off.

“Anyway. We should be there by midday. Capt’n wants the crew on deck when we set anchor.” With a wave, she ducked between two other crew who were rolling a sail after spending the morning repairing it.

He had a few hours until the meeting. Maybe he would have better luck at catching a few minutes of sleep now that the day shift had finished bustling around the lower deck.

= + =

The midday sun was beating down on the heads of the crew of the Empire’s Shield. Steve was on the port edge of the crowd. Clint and Skye slipping up beside him just as Fury cleared his throat on the [upper] deck.

“How’s Coulson?” Steve asked under his breath as Fury was outlining the repairs that were needed.

Clint shrugged. “Better but bored. Should be out of bed this afternoon if he has his way, tomorrow if I have mine.”

Steve would put his money on Clint winning the argument based purely on the toothy grin on his face. Turning his attention to the Captain just in time to hear his name called.

“Woo, Rogers, Clint you’ll be working with Simonston to chose a tree to replace the mizzen mast.” His sharp eye was on each man as he called their name to make sure they understood.

“Sir.” Steve nodded his understanding. 

Simonston, the ship’s carpenter, dipped his chin.

“Sure.” Clint shrugged.

Fury’s lips thinned slightly at Clint’s lax response but visibly let it go. They weren’t in the Navy anymore and weren’t required to hold the same level of discipline.

The briefing moved on. Skye wasn’t tasked with anything in particular. The senior officers were going to be meeting while the crew worked, to discuss their next destination.

= + =

Working until dusk, and then in every minute of light the next day, the ship slowly crept towards full repair. All of the crew were looking a little sun crisped but satisfied with their work. The island had been a veritable cornucopia, they had found a tall straight tree that Simonston had declared perfect, and a second one to replace the fore mast that had been damaged by useable.

Aside from the timber, there had been a fresh water pool to fill their water stores from, and someone had planted a small grove of apple trees on one end of the island that had gone wild in the long years the island had been left alone. 

On the first night, Mount and Triplett had caught several large red fish that he didn’t recognise. They had fed the crew well. None of them had had the energy to try and fish and a round of hard tack, jerky and a mug of beer each were passed around.

Sprawled on the soft sand, Steve ate his food and watched the stars begin to wink to life above him. It was a sight he was never going to get tired of. Counting stars, he eventually fell asleep. The sun warmed sand made a comfortable enough bed. The golden rays of the rising sun woke him early. Men and women were still sprawled around him, asleep from exhaustion. Never having needed as much sleep as other people, he decided to get started with his day.

Gathering up the water buckets, he started the walk to the pond. Silently Natasha appeared out of the low brush to join him, taking two of the five buckets. Before stepping to the clearing around the water, Natasha lay a staying hand on his arm. Her other hand putting a finger to her lips, ‘quiet’. 

Nodding curtly, he quietly put the buckets down and stretched his hearing to try and figure out what had made her stop. Settling his heart, he heard it. Two people talking as if they were the only ones around. 

“Ward. Hurry UP!” A voice snapped, breaking the silence. “I hate this place.” This was said much more quietly as if the person was talking to themself.

“You scared of the ghosts Sitwell?” A second voice sneered.

“Fuck you.” The first guy said.

Natasha tapped on his arm and tipped her head back the way they had come. Gathering up the buckets, he followed, feet light on the shifting sands.

Once they were a ways away from the pond, she shifted into a swift run, uncaring of the sound she was making now. She was in and out of the makeshift camp in seconds, skidding to a halt she sent sand flying into the faces of people just beginning to wake. 

Shouts of annoyance filled the air.

“Get packing. We are going to be on the move as soon as possible.” She ordered before throwing herself at one of the row boats lined up on the water line. 

Steve just shrugged at them and kept following her. She glared at Steve until he pushed it out into the waves and started rowing out to the Shield. 

“What’s going on? Who were they?” It was obvious that she had recognised at least one of them and they meant something to her, just not why it was such a big deal.

“I know both of them. Jasper Sitwell and Grant Ward. They were part of our crew once. Now they are part of the Hydra’s Cure.”

That was a name he did know. The ship that had burnt out the village they had stopped in. Grimly he put his whole body into getting them to the Shield, not wasting breath on asking any more questions. With quick, efficient strokes he brought them alongside the Shield. The shadow cast by the large ship raised goosebumps along his skin.

Gracefully, Natasha swung her body up the rope ladder that had been left to flap against the wood of the hull. Steve felt like an oaf climbing up after her, as if his arms had suddenly grown a foot and his legs weren’t the same length anymore. 

Natasha was already talking to Fury, Maria, and another man Steve recognised as the one he and Bucky had carried to the ship that night, Coulson the first mate. Clint’s guy.

He still didn’t look well. Skin sallow and too loose on his bones. He was propped up with a crutch under one arm, most of his weight on the support. The four of them were huddled around the table that was mostly used by Skye to plot their course. The few people on the deck were throwing curious but weary glances at the group that made up the core leadership. A few of them raised an eyebrow or tipped their head at the group at Steve, plainly asking what was up. Grimly he shook his head. He didn’t know enough about the animosity that has been simmering in Natasha’s voice to guess what the four were talking about.

Luckily, none of them had long to wait. Three minutes after Natasha had disappeared over the edge of the railing above his head, she was swinging back down the ladder, calling to Steve as she went.

“Get a move on Rogers!” She shouted, a threatening bite to her words.


	9. Skye

Stretching like an overgrown cat in the early morning sun, Skye settled back onto the blanket she had spread across the very back of the quarterdeck. She had slept out there, James was still in Jemma and her’s bed and Jemma had slept in the armchair again. She didn’t mind. One of the things she loved about Jem was her dedication and her understanding that Skye was just as determined and dedicated to her own role on the ship. That didn’t mean she didn’t miss curling up together in the soft lantern light and whispering nonsense into the night.

“Ow.” Phil complained as he eased himself onto the deck beside her. 

She didn’t believe the complaint for a second. For one because Clint never would have allowed him out of bed if he was still hurting that much. And two, he said it without an inch of inflection. More as if it was something expected of him rather than an automatic sound of distress.

Closing his eyes, he turned his face up to the sun, soaking in the warmth Skye was taking advantage of.

“You look horrible FC.” She told him, eyes tracing the new lines on his face that hadn’t been there last month.

“Thanks ever so.”

“You’re welcome.” She grinned at him. All teeth.

He smiled down at her for a second before going back to impersonating a cat with her. The creak of wood shifting on the slight waves, the clinking of metal on metal, the rustle of canvas and rope mixed with the salty air and warm sun to almost have her asleep on her blanket. She had slept well that night, but it was always a good idea to catch a nap when she could and there wasn’t much else for her to do that day, they weren’t going anywhere and she could always continue mending the torn sails after a nap.

A shadow passed over her face.

Allowing one eye to open a slit, she snapped it shut as soon as her mind registered what she was looking at.

“CLINT!” She yelled, he was standing directly above, her and had positioned himself in an extremely awkward position. For her. Not for him.

“Yes Skye?” He asked innocently.

Faker.

How did Phil put up with him? She mused, not for the first time. Knowing she secretly loved him like another Dad, just like Phil.

“Whyyyy?” She whined.

“I’m just here for Phil.” Finally he dropped down. Shuffling backwards until he was leaning against the warm wood, pressed along Phil’s far side snuggly.

“Bullshit.” Skye and Phil said at the same time. She threw a lightning quick grin at him, great minds and what not.

“I hate you both.” Clint said with no venom.

Phil smacked a loud kiss on his cheek, and Skye giggled at the rosy blush that spread high across Clint’s cheeks.

It was a simple thing. A quiet moment with people she loved, but she could never take it for granted. Tucking Clint’s blush and Phil’s cat that caught the canary grin into her heart, beside Jemma’s sleep tousled hair, Natasha’s hand-to-hand lessons, and Fury’s intimidating glare. These were her new family, and although part of her was terrified of losing it all again, she wouldn't regret meeting them. Loving them.

“Captain! Coulson! Maria!” Natasha shouted as she swung gracefully over the railing.

Skye half sat up, resting on her elbows to watch as the Captain watched his lover cross the deck towards him, and the Night’s Master appear from the closer hatch clambering easily up the ladder. Beside her, Clint helped Phil back to his feet and together with Skye kept a close eye on him as he swung across the wood to the small gathering. Both of them watching for any sign of pain or moment of hesitation in his movements. Seeing neither, Clint dropped heavily down beside her, pulling her up until she was seated under one of his impressive arms.

In silence they watched the quietly ferocious meeting. It didn’t look good. Not good at all. Like as bad as it had looked that time they sailed into Fuzhau to find smallpox was ravaging the city and Baba and Mama had had to leave three crew behind. It wasn’t a happy memory, she had been three, she thought, and this didn’t look like it would be any better she would just remember it.

“This doesn’t look fun.” Clint echoed her thoughts.

She hummed agreement.

= + =

Things moved quickly when the meeting broke up. Natasha went back the way she had come, Maria disappeared into the depths of the ship again, Fury and Phil stayed at the table.

“Skye!” Phil waved her over.

Hoping up, she had to stamp her feet a couple of times as she ran over, trying to get her legs awake.

“What up?” Even in the most dire of circumstances, she couldn’t help a little bit of sass creeping in.

“We need a route out of here. Fast.” Fury told her.

Leaving the island was easy enough, but getting out of the area quickly needed a deft hand and an understanding of the fierce currents that could drag you to the equator and into the still waters as easily as it could send you into the frozen north.

“How long do I have?” Leaving at midday would be better, they could use the pull of the tide to drag their large ship out of the lee of the island.

“Half an hour.” Fury said and then left her there, staring after him.

“Sorry Skye. Do the best you can.” Phil clapped a hand on her shoulder and then limped off to his own jobs.

= + =

“Damn it!” Skye wanted to throw her compass. There wasn’t any way to get them out of the area quickly. “I’m sorry.” She said more quietly to the shadow over her shoulder. Clint hadn’t left her side since the Captain had called her over. She knew he was hovering over her because he couldn’t hover over Phil.

“It’s okay.” Clint reassured her.

She appreciated the effort, but didn’t believe him. It wasn’t okay. She should be able to do this in her sleep. Get them into or out of anywhere.

“I can’t do it.” She whispered. “Everything is wrong for us getting out of here anytime this week.” She wanted to cry, but wouldn’t. She wouldn’t.

Instead she carefully rolled her maps. Stowing them each into the special waxed leather tubes that kept the water out in bad weather. That protected them from harm, just like the maps themselves protected the crew by taking them to safe harbour.

Shouts came from above and were echoed by more shouting from the beach, dulled by the waves and the sounds of a ship never still. Side by side they rushed to the railing closest to shore. The few crew members who were still on shore had weapons drawn, knives, two swords, and a single pistol that Skye knew was more useful for a big bang and smoke than as a weapon. Facing them were four people Skye didn’t know, but the impressive round of swearing from Clint told her he did.

“Who are they?” She whispered. She wasn’t sure why she had whispered, it wasn’t like the strangers could hear her over a hundred feet of water with the sounds of the boat and the crash of the waves between them. She could have shouted at the top of her lungs and they might have heard the sound but not the words.

“Grant Ward, Jasper Sitwell, and John Garrett. They were part of the crew before everything. But left when Pierce defected.”

Skye knew it hadn’t been a defection. It had been a failed mutiny. She shivered, it hadn’t been something she had ever experienced, but it was a looming nightmare for anyone who lived their lives under the flapping canvas. She couldn’t imagine going through  _ two  _ of them like Clint and Phil had.

“What are they doing here?” She mused to herself.

“Dunno.” He answered her anyway. “I should go.” Without waiting for an answer, he swung up the rigging further down the deck. She turned to watch him scamper up the ropes. It was a little weird checking out Clint’s ass, Phil was basically her adopted father at this point and he was sleeping with Clint which made him her defacto dad. But it was a glorious ass that deserved ogling.

Turning her attention back to the beach, she couldn’t see if anything had changed. The stand off still on-going. Glancing up to see Clint stringing his bow, seh figured he had the right idea of it. One of the well stocked boxes of muskets was sitting beside the mizzen mast.

Armed she was back at the railing, tension making it hard to hold the gun steady.

= + =

Eventually someone, Piper she thought, waved a white shirt tied to a long stick. Skye snorted a laugh and began unloading the rifle. A boat cuts through the water in a straight line for the Shield. Skye steadies one of the ladders to allow Piper and Natasha to swing up easily. She waved at Steve who stayed in the little boat.

There were two options available to her. She could be a good girl and stay where she was. Watching the action from a safe distance. Or. Or she could be waiting in the boat for whoever went ashore and if they were in a hurry they might let her stay.

It was an easy decision.

She dropped quickly over the side of the ship. Hand over hand, she moved easily and quickly downward. Growing up on ships and around ships, made climbing swinging ropes as easy as walking down a street was for land lovers.

“Steve.” She nodded at the man. Beside his name, she barely knew him. He and James had only been with the crew a short time and they had both had other things to worry about since then. “Nice day.”

“Very.” He agreed.

They sat in awkward silence, the thwap of the wet rope against the wood the only sound. She spent thirty seconds looking at the beach, but could only see the sand and the people on it, on the swell of the waves. Looking up the way she had come wasn’t any more interesting. Finally, she looked back at Steve. He looked as uncomfortable as she felt.

“How’s James going?” She had zero clue what else she could ask.


	10. Fury

“Thank god.” Skye muttered.

He threw her a questioning look, but shook it away before she could answer. He didn’t want to know. It was almost always better not to know when Skye was involved.

“To the beach Rogers.” Fury ordered, shifting his weight carefully to make sure he wasn’t unbalancing the little boat.

Maria unthinkingly shifted with him. He kept the satisfied smile to himself watching the Rogers cut through the water easily. Oars cutting into the waves. The crew he had kept through two mutinies and gathered around him since was the best. Each of them knowing their strengths and weaknesses and working within and around them without having to be told.

Using the time of the trip, he eyed up each of his people. Nothing he saw surprised him. Rogers was determined and focused on cutting through the water quickly. Maria was stony faced, which she always was. She had always kept her emotions and thoughts closely guarded and that hold had only gotten tighter since Pierce defected. Skye was bright eyed, excited with a strong undercurrent of fear. She was as crazy as Barton when it came to her own safety. She should have stayed on the Shield and if he had known she was on the small boat before he had climbed down, he would have ordered her back up. He wasn’t sure how Pierce’s crew were going to react with him turning up with half of his group being female and half of them being people of colour, they hadn’t been the most accepting or open of groups before they split off, and he couldn’t imagine it had gotten better in their echo chamber. 

He also didn’t care.

Those fuckers could go screw themselves.

= + =

Tension lay over the beach like fog on a cold London morning. It made Fury’s bones ache in a way that made him glad he didn’t have to return to merry old England every again. Couldn’t in fact.

Jumping into the ankle deep waves, he strode purposefully up the beach towards his people. Piper met him halfway while the rest continued their staring contest with the interlopers.

“They say they are here for repairs as well Captain, sir.” She muttered to him, making sure she was facing away from the three crew members from the Curse.

Fury looked over the three men in the new light. Small cuts and bruises on the bits of skin he could see, and the black burns and freshly stitched cloth spoke of a recent, hard fight. They looked tired. Most people living outside the law did, but there was an oil slick of exhaustion over the bone deep weariness of their chosen lifestyle. Taking in their state of disrepair, he could well believe they were here to fix their ship. That didn’t mean he didn’t also suspect treachery. Pierce could have roughed up a few of his people and sent them out as bait.

“Okay. Keep your weapon’s close.” He murmured back at Piper.

She nodded understanding and stepped aside, letting him past. He couldn’t see her, but was confident she was following his orders. Quietly moving through their people passing on the quiet warning.

“Sitwell.” He left a good ten feet of sand between the Curse’s crew and his own people.

“Fury.”

They had been close once. Many nights worn away on shore leave over never ending tankards of beer. He barely recognised his one time friend.

“Why are you here?” He called across the neutral ground.

“Same as you.” Sitwell waved at the almost finished replacement mast that was still on trestles behind Fury.

“You lost a mast in a storm?” Fury lied, fishing for information.

Behind Sitwell, Garrett was hissing at Ward. Their heads bent close together in conference. Before Sitwell answered Fury’s query, Ward was jogging away, back into the thick jungle.

“If a storm took out that mast, I’m still a Marine.” Sitwell scoffed, calling Fury’s bluff.

“Guess you’re still a Marine then. Congratulations.” Fury doubled down. He wasn’t going to admit that an unknown ship had taken them out.

“You leave us alone, we leave you alone.” Sitwell offered, ignoring Fury’s lie.

“Fine.” They all nodded and the two remaining men followed their younger crewmate into the trees.

= + =

Fury didn’t return to the ship. Stalking between the shoreline and the trees. Watching for any rustle of leaves that were out of place. He had sent Clint and Mount into the interior of the island to scout. Try and figure out why Pierce and his people were here. He didn’t trust them to hold up their end of the bargain. Day slowly slipped into night and he ordered fires set along the beach and work to continue on the repairs, he wanted to be out of there as soon as possible.

Barton was the first to return. Appearing at his side from the shadows unnoticed.

“Hey Boss.” Clint matched his stride length to Fury’s walking with him as the Captain continued prowling the beach. “They’re hurting. Worse than us.” He confirmed Sitwell’s story without being asked.

“How?” Fury asked.

“Definitely wasn’t the weather.” Clint quipped. “Looked like cannon fire to me. Wonder who it was? There is some serious damage there.”

Fury knew the younger man was just going to keep talking unless he said something. Instead he just walked away. The lookout still babbling to himself. The night wore on, the few birds and rats in the trees quieting as the dark drew in. Tension thrummed under his skin, pulled taut under his skin. The feeling of a storm gathering on the horizon and all he could do was wait for it to break.

“Fury.” A voice called from the shadows well after the moon had passed its zenith. 

The tension snapped like a hair under a Japanese blade.

“Pierce.” He turned towards the voice, stepping into the shadows, the figure of the man who had held Maria’s role before her swam into focus. “What are you doing here?”

“Come on.” Pierce waved him further into the shadows. “Not here.”

Fury had a choice. He could stay and never find out what Pierce wanted. Or he could follow and potentially get his throat slit on a haunted island. Pierce himself wasn’t a threat, Fury could take him easily, but one or more of his men could be laying in wait. There just wasn’t any reason he could think of. Barton had said their ship was damaged and they knew the Shield wasn’t in any better condition. Neither of them were going anywhere fast.

He stepped into the deep black under the jungle canopy.

Pierce led him to the spring. At no point during the walk did Fury get any indication that they weren’t the only two people under the shadows of the trees. He knew that didn’t mean much, with his own crew Barton, Mount, and Piper could move through any environment without anyone else realized they were there. It didn’t matter if it was the echoing wood of a ship, the suffocating streets of a city, or the rustling underbrush of wild forest. If they didn’t want to be seen, they wouldn’t be. Fury could name at least two on Pierce’s crew who could do the same.

Exhaustion hung heavy on Pierce’s shoulders. He slumped, bonelessly, onto a half rotten log beside the crystal clear spring. His head dropped into his hands, a show of weakness Fury never would have expected from him. In their long years with the Royal Marines he had never seen Pierce so much as yawn. It sent his balance of the world into a tumble, a current he hadn’t seen grabbing hold and trying to pull him under.

“It’s bad Fury.”

He almost missed the words, muffled in his wide hands.

“What’s bad?” Fury stayed standing, arms crossed defensively, the tips of his fingers on one hand resting lightly on the hilt of one of his many hidden daggers strapped to the underside of a forearm.

“This new ship. I assume that’s who hurt you so bad. It is who got us.” Pierce looked up finally, accusingly.

“Green and black sails?” Fury asked. It was the most identifiable thing about the ship that had attacked them, along with the thickness of the hull. But that wasn’t as unique, not common but you could find ships venturing down from the Northern waters.

“Northern design? Ice-breaker hull.” Pierce confirmed.

“We got hit just off the coast of Morocco.” Fury finally sat.


	11. James

They had been at Isla de los fantasmas for five days, and it was more than a week since the attack that had stolen his arm. James hadn’t yet left the doctor’s cabin. Unwilling to face the pity of the crew he hadn’t built a place for himself and Stevie in yet.

His days were filled with having Jemma check the wound site, talking with Jemma and Skye when she was about, and reading one of Jemma’s incomprehensible books. He liked the two women. He liked that they had invited him into their space, or at least that Skye hadn’t made a fuss about him still being there. 

“I’m bored.” Skye complained, flopping onto the bed next to where James was trying to read by the scant light from the window. Looking up at him she fluttered her eyelashes.

He huffed a quiet chuckle but tried to ignore her.

“Skye, leave him alone.” Jemma grabbed Skye by the foot and wriggled it. The lounging woman was relaxed enough that her whole leg wobbled with the movement.

She pouted up at her partner playfully. “You’ll entertain me won’t you Bucky?” She rolled until she was pressed against him.

“Skye.” Jemma’s voice held a warning he didn’t understand.

“Or we could all entertain each other?” Skye glanced at Jemma, raising an eyebrow at the Doc as she blushed.

He felt like he was missing a vital piece of the conversation and without it, he wasn’t going to understand the subtext of what was going on. The two women were ignoring him, shooting each other significant looks and slanting their eyes at him and away. The missing piece had to do with him, and he had the feeling it was to do with his continued presence in their room.

Had he finally overstayed his welcome?

Sliding from the bed he stood, that was easy enough to fix. He would just excuse himself and leave. Give them their space back, even if it left him cold and feeling as if he had lost something.

“I’ll just, um. Right.” He thumbed the door and slipped out, trying not to brush up against Jemma in the small space. 

He was out the door and halfway up the ladder to freedom before either of them could say anything.

“James, wait!” Jemma called from behind him.

Ignoring her, he breathed in the fresh salt air and was blinking in the bright sunlight. Eyes watering slightly from the rapid change, he breathed deeply when he saw that she hadn't followed. Whatever the problem had been she wasn’t willing to air it in front of the rest of the crew and he was grateful. The fresh air 

“Bucky!” Steve waved at him from above.

Shimmying down the ropes, the taller blonde man dodged the rest of the crew as he crossed the deck. They were underway, having left the safety of the Isla de los fantasmas on the early morning tide a few hours ago. Looking back he could just see a speck of green and white on the distant horizon. The crew looked nervous. Working with brutal efficiency to complete the final few repairs they hadn’t gotten to at the island. With the ship sailing a few hundred feet to the North of them, they were heading into a battle James didn’t know if they were ready for. 

“You okay?” Steve asked, wiping a grimey hand over a forehead glistening with sweat.

Rather than answer, he grabbed a scoop of water from the barrel strapped to the railing and passed it to his oldest friend. The distraction didn’t work for long.

“Buck?”

He shrugged. He wasn’t okay, but wasn’t sure how to tell Steve that. Tell the other man that he hadn’t wanted to leave the cabin, leave the two women inside, but had to. He wouldn’t hurt either of them, just because he couldn’t control the swell of feelings he felt for both of them. It wasn’t right. He had known he didn’t want to see either of the women hurt, but the night before as Skye told them what Fury and the rest of the officers had agreed to, he had realised it went deeper than that. That in a single, short week he had come to care about them more than he should. Maybe even love them. But you couldn’t love more than one person at a time. Not properly. Right?

So better to say nothing, rather than risk screwing up the amazing thing they had together by lumping his screwed up feelings into the mix.

“I’m fine Stevie.” He finally said, voice gruff. Shrugging off the large warm hand on his shoulder, he stalked away looking for a moment of quiet on a ship filled to the brim.

= + =

He didn’t find it. Every corner he tried at least one person was already there. He looked up at Barton perched in his nest with envy. That high, he could put up with the presence of another person. Especially Barton, the man could be a moron when off duty but was dedicated when on and wouldn’t be chatty.

Another thing his injury had stolen from him. 

Huddled down at the bow of the Shield, he was wedged between a couple of barrels that hid him from most of the people working on deck, but let him watch the waves slamming into the wood of the hull, surges of white foam reaching up to cool his face.

“I didn’t mean to chase you out before.” Under the crash of water Skye had managed to sneak up on him, but he was wedged in well enough that he could barely flinch at the sound of her voice.

Looking up at her, he smiled weakly. Facial muscles straining to put the lie on his face. “You didn’t.”

“Well, that’s a lie.” She dropped gracelessly down on the other side of his barrel fort. “But that’s okay. You were uncomfortable.  _ I _ made you uncomfortable and I never wanted to do that.”

He shrugged. Uncomfortable all over again.

“We’ve talked about it you know… Not entertaining each other. Well, not  _ only _ . We both like you James. And we get the feeling you like us?” 

She watched him with eyes that saw too much, the blush he tried to hide and the fact he couldn’t meet her eye. It answered her question without him saying a word.

“If you are interested, truly interested not just looking for a bed to warm, you are welcome back in our cabin. If not,” doubt was heavy in her voice, “we can go back, to just being friends.” With a final, small smile she left him to it. 

He sat for a long time. Thinking about what she had said. What he felt. How much of himself he could give, because he knew if he went back it wouldn’t be some casual affair. It would be everything.

The sun set, gold and red glinting off the far horizon.

As the chill of night settled around him he finally moved. A phantom moving through the gathering dark. 

Standing outside the door to their cabin he hesitated. Their voices were soft through the wood.

“Give him time.” Jemma was saying.

Skye’s response too low for him to hear.

He had known Skye had meant it when she came to talk to him hours earlier, but Jemma’s actual interest in it all had still been in question. He didn’t wait any longer, he took his heart in his hand and opened the door.

= + =

A beautiful woman laying panting along either side of his body was how he wanted to die he decided, struggling to get his own breath back.

“So, which of us is the big spoon?” Jemma asked once she could string more than two words together. About all she had managed for the last long while had been “God Yes!” and “More!”

“Who uses three spoons?” James wondered out loud.

“Then we’re chopsticks and you’re our tasty tasty dumpling.” Skye offered.

He could feel her smile pressed into his left pectoral. He had no idea what she was talking about. On his other side, Jemma shook with giggles. That didn’t seem fair somehow.

“Yes! Chopsticks!” She started openly laughing and Skye propped her chin on his chest to grin happily at them both.

Smoothing his hand through Skye’s messed hair, marveling that he was  _ allowed _ to, he asked, “What are chopsticks?”

Instantly, their delight turned to open mouthed shock. 

“You don’t…” Skye couldn't even finish her question. 

Jemma tumbled gracelessly out of bed, an ill-timed wave sending her stumbling. The candle light flickered across her porcelain skin enticingly. Why had she gotten out of bed? That didn’t seem right. For long seconds she sorted through a box that lived under her narrow workbench, body moving unthinkingly with the roll of the ship under them. He watched the golden light dance on her naked back. If asked, he would have to admit he got distracted by the view.

“Here.” She thrust something at him and climbed back into bed.

Forced to take it or risk her dropping it on him. It wouldn’t have hurt, the package too small for that, but trying to find it in the tangle of people and blankets would have been annoying. And cold.

Unwrapping the smooth fabric wrap, he found two thin wooden sticks. So thin he was worried about snapping them, and so dark he doubted he would be able to see the grain of the wood in the midday sun, he didn;t have a chance in the half-light of the candles.

“Here.” Carefully, Skye maneuvered his fingers and the sticks. “Move your fingers like this,” she applied a tiny bit of pressure, “and pick something up. There were what we used back home instead of knives and forks.”

Awkwardly he pinched his fingers a few times in the pattern she had shown him. Once he thought he had the hang of it, he tried to pick up the corner of a sheet that was laying across Jemma’s waist. The stocks tumbled onto the bed, out of his control, faster than he could realise what was happening. He grumbled at the wood. At least Skye and Jemma were laughing again.

“Try again.” Jemma urged kindly, face flushed from mirth.


	12. Clint

Every second he was on watch instead of hovering over Phil chaffed. He knew it was his job and that Phil hated being fussed over, but he couldn’t help it. The sticky feeling and metallic smell of Phil’s lifeblood coating his hands wasn’t a faint enough memory yet. They hadn’t had enough time. He wasn’t sure they would ever have enough time even if they both lived to ninety. Hating every second of it didn’t mean he wasn’t doing his job, god damn it. He was a professional. 

He would sit in the crows nest for every tortuous second until Mount came to relieve him, and he would protect his people. The only thing Phil would hate more than being fussed over would be Clint getting one of their people hurt because he was fussing over Phil instead of doing his goddamn job.

One hour left.

One hour and he could go and check on Phil and pretend he hadn’t spent the last eight hours waiting to get back into the dark recesses of the ship that he usually avoided like the plague.

One more hour.

Shit.

He wasn’t going anywhere soon. A spot of darkness on the horizon had finally coalesced enough that he could tell it was a ship and not just a speck of nothingness or uncharted land.

Shit.

He rang the bell. Five long peels for an unknown ship, another long peel for true north and then a continual shrill of short peals for right on the horizon. 

Five minutes later he knew. It was the ship they were looking for. He wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Three quick flicks of his wrist to update the rest of the crew and send them scrambling. Around him full sails were replaced by half mended canvas and he knew somewhere below Fury was watching and waiting for his moment.

The Shield had to be close enough for the other ship to know they were still hurting and make chase, but not so close they would catch them before the trap could be sprung. Achingly slowly, they turned, instead of following their original heading of north-east they made a ninety degree turn and headed north-west. Somewhere below that far horizon, Hydra lurked in amongst a small uncharted and often forgotten archipelago. If they kept their word, and Clint doubted they would, they would trap the black and green newcomer in the rapidly shifting sand banks and rain hellfire down on them.

= + =

Mount joined Clint even before his shift started, and then Bucky. It was tight with all three men and their weapons, but Bucky wouldn’t be of use down low, Clint was better up high, but he needed a rest before things kicked off so Mount was their eyes as the sun slowly drifted away. The spark of fire inched slowly closer as the night wore on. Clint napped wrapped into a ball in the corner of the nest with a thin blanket; his only protection against the cool, wasn’t awake to see it though. He was flying in his dreams. Soaring through cotton wool clouds in an azure sky. Far below, little more than a dark pin prick on a neverending golden beach, was Phil. Healthy and waiting for him to come down. Always patient as Clint flew away and back again. His anchor, or lodestone in the dark.

“Clint.” A voice that wasn’t Phil’s intruded. “Clint!” Was followed with a hard poke.

“Wha?” He stuck his head out of his blanket, expecting to be in the dim interior of his and Phil’s cabin it took him a few seconds to recognise where he was. Bucky was leant over him and the wide swathe of the pre-dawn sky stretched behind him. The crow’s nest, it came back to him with a jolt. The plan and the creeping ship. How could he have forgotten that?

It was closer than it had been when he went to sleep, the tiny ant-sized people were visible now.

“How long until…” He let the question drift off.

“Hour after dawn.” Bucky answered the half finished question. It was the only question that mattered at the moment.

Glancing to the East, he knew dawn was a matter of seconds away. Looking down, the rest of the crew were lashing down anything that could be a trip hazard when things started getting busy and making sure weapons were close at hand. Getting as ready as they could.

A hand tapped his shoulder before a canvas wrapped package about the size of his clenched fist was shoved in front of his nose. Nodding at Mount, he took the offering and quickly untied the wrapping. Hard bread and salted fish. Uninspiring but filling and as good as any of them were going to get until this mess was cleaned up.

Choking it down with help from large mouthfuls of water ice cold from the night air, he struggled to keep it down, the beginning flood of anticipatory adrenalin turning his stomach. As much as his body was trying to reject the food right then, he knew he would need it later.

Each minute the enemy ship came a little bit closer. It was hell. Clint had had to wait for a target to come into his sight before, but acting the mouse to a cat that had already swatted them around good was torture. Specs of land appeared on the horizon. Judging the distance and how fast each of them were shrinking between the Shield and the other ship, and the Shield and the islands, Clint doubted they would make it in time.

This wasn’t going to work.

= + =

What had they been thinking, this wasn’t going to work. Clint twisted an arrow between his fingers, his strung bow in the other hand. At the shrill whistle from below, Bucky touched a lit reed to the head of his arrow and Clint drew and released. Fire streaked through the sky. A boom and splash of a cannon taking their distance followed close on the arrows heels. He couldn’t stop the reflective look back. The black and green ship was almost on them. This wasn’t going to work.

Fury was bellowing below. Mount swung out of the nest and hit the ground running, while Clint and Bucky settled into as stable firing positions as they could find Clint with his bow in hand and a full quiver of every type of arrow he had ever dreamed up and Bucky with a modified rifle against his shoulder. Their range was longer than the heavy cannonballs’, taking a breath he loosed again. He had another arrow in the air before the first found its mark, which it did, and then a third and a forth. He fired steadily, with the sharp crack of Bucky’s gun a counterpoint to the whistling silence of his own weapon. They had split the ship, Clint taking the stern and Bucky the bow. Every arrow took its target and Bucky was decimating with 85% of his bullets. The few that missed were by a hair's breadth.

They were sowing chaos, but it wasn’t enough. Clint had used half of his quiver when the first cannonball hit the Shield, ripping through newly repaired canvas. He had just let off the last one when they slipped into the lee of the first island, another two iron balls of death had hit them after the first, each finding marks but nothing crippling. One more nautical mile and their trap could be sprung.

Sails bloomed over the small shrubs on the island to their starboard side. Clint left the crow’s nest to Bucky, the other man still had bullets to rain on the enemy and Jemma had insisted that his injuries weren’t healed enough to withstand close combat. He was to stay in the crow’s nest, Clint gave it 50/50 odds that he would follow those orders. 

Taking up two swords, he swung one onto his back and kept the other in hand. Readying himself for the fight of his life. Phil stepped up beside him.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” There was no way Jemma had signed off on Phil fighting.

“We need every blade we have.”

“Not at risk of you life!” Clint turned on him.

“But at risk of yours?” Phil bit back, fire in his shining blue eyes.

All Clint could do was reel the older man in and press a hard kiss to his lips. “If you die, I will kill you.”

Phil laughed, a sharp sound of happyness splitting the tension of waiting.

“Right back at you.”

“Look out!” The shout was barely audible, floating down on the still air from on high.

Clint and Phil both ducked, the wind of the passing cannonball ruffling their hair. Standing once again, a body slammed into Clint, dragging him away from Phil. It wasn’t anybody he knew, a dagger flashed in the other man’s hand. Clint was fast, his blade sinking into the other man’s throat sending a gush of warm metal over his hand. Pulling his knife from the deadman’s body, he turned to meet the next soon to be dead man. 

It was smoke and fire, crashing and the spray of stinging water after that. They lost each other and then came back together, over and over. Clint stumbled as the ship under his feet swung around without warning. The change pulled the woman he was fighting out of weapon’s reach long enough for Clint to glance around. The boom of cannon from three ships were overlapping, a constant echo of sound pressing on Clint’s already shitty hearing. 

The green and black monster that had come so close to defeating them off Morocco was looking as ragged as they had after their first encounter. Two ships winning where the one had failed. The fight wasn’t over though. The woman with blood on her teeth and death in her eyes was back on him. Sparks flying from where their swords met.

She was faster than him, darting around and through his attacks. A swing that would have taken his hand faltered. Bloor bubbled over lips gone slack with surprise. She dropped to reveal Phil’s grim face.

They nodded at each other, spinning to be back to back, them against the chaos of a world gone mad.

Slowly, the boom of cannon slowed. A horn call drifting over the waves and above the smoke. For once, Clint couldn’t see. Couldn’t see who was calling a retreat and which cannon were falling silent.

“Not us.” Phil tapped against his back. His hearing much better than Clint’s and able to tell whose sounds were whose.

Things slowed down further. Fighters, stepping back as their enemy ran. Shoulders slumped and weapons only avoided hitting the deck because no true warrior would drop their weapon and Fury only took true warriors on his ship.

The black and green monster was barely limping. Sitting too low in the water, they would be lucky to make shore. Clint didn’t think they had any luck saved up.


	13. Maria

As the sun set Maria sat back, for once able to enjoy the rapidly approaching night without having to worry about checking to make sure her people weren’t nodding off at their posts or that the Shield hadn’t drifted off course.

She could sit back and watch her friends, her family, revel in their happiness and the high of driving the enemy ship off and the tentative peace that had held just long enough. The Shield had taken more damage than the Curse. Much more. But for once Pierce had held his word and not pressed his advantage. Maria still wasn’t sure why but she wasn’t going to question the good grace.

A bonfire sent embers swirling into the sky. Stars close enough to touch if you were willing to be burnt.

The sand around the fire was littered with people. From her place on the grass, she could watch her people, keep them safe as they lost themselves in each other. The guardian angel who others thought was cursed to perpetual loneliness but just enjoyed their own company more than the complications of all of that was worth.

Closest to the fire was Phil and Clint. Arms wound around each other in a tight embrace, the bright light catching on the crows feet at the corner of Phil’s eye and on the golden strands of Clint’s hair. Phil was still moving slowly, a second wound from an errant sword was still healing. Clint had quietly started shifting their things from the cabin that would always be theirs even if someone else was sleeping in it, into a small, half built cabin on the bluff above Tabaiba two days after returning to the recovering village. 

Maria wasn’t surprised. She would miss them both, Phil more than Clint, but after Fury Phil was the oldest of them and neither of them were as attached to the sea as Fury and Natasha were. A secret part of her had always known they would be the first to leave them, the double injury just made it happen faster.

Half a step behind the two, were her Captain and his deadly love. They were as reliable as the seasonal storms, deadly and coming out of nowhere but always there waiting to catch an unwary soul. 

She quickly turned her attention from them, it was like staring into the abyss of a starless night where the darkness could seduce a person into deadly folly.

A sharp bark of laughter split the crackle of the fire. One of their two newest. A man Maria barely knew but would trust to have her back always. He had saved her life with his gun during the fight and would make a passable replacement for Barton, with a little seasoning. Further into the shadows, almost invisible, the people were lounging on a blanket. In the dark it was hard to tell who was who, but the larger figure was definitely Barnes. He went to say something, arm swinging wide to make his point but forgetting his recent loss he ended up throwing himself to the ground. Light laughter covered his embarrassment and was soon followed by a masculine guffaw. She thought it might be the first time she heard him laugh. The trio surprised her. Skye and Simmons had seemed settled and easy with each other, why would they add the complication of a newcomer to their little world? She would watch and wait just in case it wasn’t smooth sailing for them.

With a group of townspeople around him, Stark was peacocking. An eye always on the bent, golden blonde head of Steve Rogers. The other man was oblivious, eyes on a pad of rough paper in his lap or darting looks around but never settling on any one person or place. Maria idly wondered if he was any good with the charcoal in his hand, and started making bets on whether he would cotton on to Tony’s display or if the blacksmith would lose patiences and make a more bullheaded advance. She foresaw a good few months of enjoyment watching them sort themselves out. 

When he didn’t manage to catch and keep Steve’s attention, Tony went bigger. Louder.

“He is going to be insufferable for weeks. Here.” Pepper dropped onto the log Maria had been hiding out on, a steaming mug in each hand. She held one out to Maria in offering.

“Thanks.” Maria took a long draft from the slightly too hot mulled cider, spices burst across her tongue. The flavours were carefully, and greedily hoarder by Bruce and were only brought out for special occasions. She wasn’t quite sure what made tonight special, but was thankful for it anyway.

“More insufferable than usual? I don’t think that’s possible.” Maria joked.

“Unfortunately, it is completely possible. Hopefully having Phil around to hassle will take some of it off me.” Pepper took a deep swallow of her own drink, sighing in pleasure.

Maria shook her head in wonder. “I’ve never understood that relationship. They should be trying to kill each other.”

For two such different people, oil and water, or oil and fire. An explosion waiting to happen, that would take the world out with them. But instead, they were a regal cat putting on a show of barely tolerating the new puppy, but secretly loving the little rascal and doting on it.

“And those two?” Pepper broke the comfortable silence that had settled between the two women. She nodded at Bruce and Leo Fitz. Both quiet, kind men that Maria barely knew. 

Fitz had arrived on the Shield as Jemma’s shadow. He had been hurt, and was still hurting. She had seen him watching the waves on nights when the monsters pulled him from his sleep.

Bruce had come to Tabaiba after the town had left Tenerife. Appearing town one between one visit and the next as if he had always been there. 

The loner of the ship and the town were on their own log a little closer to the fire than Maria’s own. They had been quietly talking for hours, shifting closer as the night wore on. It made Maria glad to see. She didn’t know them as well as she should, but she knew they both deserved happiness.

All of the crew did. And they just might get there.


End file.
